When Sakura Moved In
by TheGirlWhoWatchedTheSky
Summary: Sakura gets adopted by the Uchiha family. And mischief is bound to ensue when Haruno sakura meets Uchiha Sasuke. Chapter 22 is up! AU.
1. Chapter 1

Authors Note:

Disclaimer: I do NOT own Naruto, okay? Naruto belongs to Masashi Kishimoto.

After her parents died, they put Sakura into an orphanage—and now she was being adopted-moved to a foster home.

Sakura sat in the orphanage office, twirling a lock of her pink hair around her finger. She was waiting for her foster Parents to get here. The rosette had her black backpack on, her red bag hanging from her shoulder across her chest, and her viola on her right shoulder. There was also a smallish green suitcase by her feet.

Sakura stared at Anko at the reception desk.

Sakura twiddled her thumbs.

Sakura stared at the ceiling.

Sakura blinked at the clock.

It was about 10 A.M.

Any minute now.

And just then, the doorbell rang.

Anko, the receptionist in the Orphanage, quit tapping at her computer keyboard and looked up. She tucked a strand of purple hair behind her ear, rose, and opened the door. A man and Woman entered. The woman had long black hair and kind, charcoal eyes. The man, too, had black hair and dark eyes, but his were colder.

The woman grinned at Anko, nodding, then turned to the pink haired. She walked towards Sakura, heels click-clacking on the hard floor.

"Hello," she said, holding out her hand, "you must be Haruno Sakura. I'm Uchiha Mikoto. Pleasure to meet you."

Sakura took her hand.

Mikoto turned around and gestured to the man, who was leaning against a wall, arms crossed. He walked forward.

"This is my husband—"

"I am Fugaku Uchiha. Captain of the Konoha Police force."

He was frowning. Sakura didn't really get why. But anyway, he didn't want to shake her hand, or say anything else, it seemed. Regardless, he gave Sakura the creeps. Tolerable, but creepy.

"Nice to meet you," was all Sakura could manage.

Not.

"Ok!" Mikoto said, "well, we're going to take you to your new home now, Sakura. Do you have any more suitcases or anything?" she asked, looking around. What she didn't know was that Sakura's family was quite poor. All the Rosette had were the things she had with her.

"Just this," Sakura said, pointing to her green suitcase on the floor.

"Okay," Mikoto said. "Let's go."

Sakura picked up her suitcase and stood up, following Mikoto to the door. She waved to Anko on the way out, smiling weakly.

"Good Luck!" Anko trilled.

And they were off.

Outside, it was a dark, stormy morning. Thunderous clouds rumbled across the horizon, rain fell down in sheets. A faint breeze blew.

Sakura loved the rain.

She stopped in the middle of the sidewalk, blinking up at the sky. Rain made her mellow, calmed her down. Somehow, everything was softer when it rained.

Well, the two Uchiha didn't like it.

"Come on, Sakura, come on! You don't wanna catch a cold!" Mikoto beckoned, quickly following Fugaku to their car.

Or should I say vehicle.

It was a huge, orange monster of a car, a thing only the very rich could possibly afford.

The lights flashed on and off with a _BLEEP BLEEP_ and everyone got in. Sakura put her green suitcase up on her knees and leaned against it, elbows on top. She was sitting in the back, Mikoto and Fugaku in the front. The rain splashed against the windows as they drove off.

A moment later, the car jerked to an abrupt halt.

Fugaku narrowed his eyes at Sakura in the rearview mirror.

"Seatbelt."

"Oh -yeah."

Sakura struggled with the belt and finally heard it go in.

"Ready?" Mikoto asked.

"Yeah," Sakura grinned weakly, "uh-ready."

And the awkward car ride began.

They were off.

Again.

A/N: Hey everyone! So…how was it? PLEASE review! Seriously. Please.


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: **

**Sorry the last chapter was so short! I'll try to make this one longer. This is the chapter where she meets Sasuke :D**

**And thank you soooooo much to everyone who reviewed: Izzy1001, silver lone wolf, xXRavenous-TidesXx, and Rose Tiger. You guys ROCK! **

**Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto. **

When they got out of the car 30 minutes later, Sakura's mouth fell open, dumbfounded. The house was huge.

Massive.

It was more than two acres, with balconies and spiral towers.

With a lake and a forest behind that.

And a well. And a deck. And a patio.

There were fountains, too.

Everyone went into the house, up the cobbled sidewalk, past the green lawn. Inside, the floor was polished wood, with a dining room on the left, a TV room up ahead, next to that was another dining room and the massive kitchen, behind that was the morning room, and from the morning room was a clear door that led outside to the deck. To her right was a walk in closet, and past that was a hallway with another section of the house, with a door at the end. Next to the closet was the first staircase, intricate wood carvings making up the railings. And above that—

"I'll show you 'round," Mikoto smiled kindly at Sakura. She and Fugaku took off their shoes and put them in the closet. Sakura followed suit, slipping off her wet sneakers.

She put down her bags on the floor in front of the closet.

Meanwhile, Fugaku walked away towards the kitchen. He disappeared from view.

Silently, Sakura thanked God.

She followed Mikoto up the steps. Those were polished wood, too. Except there was a rug on top.

"I'll show you the downstairs later, after lunch. Okay! Just to let you know, I have two boys, Itachi and Sasuke. They're around here somewhere. Anyway," she grinned back at the rosette, "this is the bonus room."

There was a T.V. and sofa.

"You can come here whenever you like. Over here is Itachi's room."

She pointed to a large wood door, then knocked on it.

"Itachi! Itachi, are you in there?"

There was some rustling, and then the door opened. A tall guy, with black hair and dark eyes.

There were scars on his face, too.

He was wearing and dark T shirt with the Uchiha crest on the front. Under that were a pair of worn out jeans.

He broke out into a grin, then grabbed Sakura's hands between his.

Her face heated up, but Itachi seemed quite oblivious.

"Hi! So you must be Sakura, huh?" he went on chattily, "great to meet you!"

"Uh…great to meet you..too."

"Itachi's 20," Mikoto was saying, "he's...5 years older than you, right?"

"Right."

Itachi let go of Sakura's hands and pushed his door open a little wider so they could see into his bedroom. A closet was in there, along with a bathroom. There was a piano keyboard and two computers with lots of wires and electronics and stuff. On the wall was a poster of Beethoven, next to that was a painting of Bach. There was a small skylight fixed into the ceiling, and a smallish window. Rain battered against them.

His twin sized bed was pushed into the bed like it didn't really matter.

"Yes, he wants to be a musician in the future. All right Sakura, let's go."

Mikoto led Sakura away.

"Again, it was awesome to meet you! Welcome to our house!" Itachi called from behind them.

Sakura sent out a cheerful wave.

"…And this is Sasuke's room. He's 16, so a little older than you. You'll be going to the same school in the fall. Sasuke!" Mikoto called through another door. When no one answered, she sighed irritably and pushed open the door.

There was no one inside.

The walls were blue, there was a desk and computer. A guitar leaned lazily in the corner. There was a huge window and closet, plus a bathroom.

It was pretty much a boring room.

"Oh, that boy. I don't know what to do with him. Anyway," Mikoto said, shutting the door, "and this," she walked around a corner and down a hallway, "is our master bedroom."

She opened it for a brief 5 seconds, but what Sakura glimpsed was amazing.

A huge room, with a huge bed, and a huge T.V., with a huge closet, and a huge bathroom, with a huge mirrored wall—

Just imagine a lot of hugeness, okay?

Mikoto started walking away, Sakura followed, overcoming the slight shock.

"And here is your room."

She opened a door opposite of Sasuke's, on the other side of the bonus room, and led Sakura in.

It was a cool room, with light purple and green walls. There was a closet, a bathroom, a huge window, a desk with a computer, a dresser, and another glass door.

"That leads out onto a balcony," Mikoto said, pointing at the glass door, "you can go out there whenever you like."

"Wow…" Sakura breathed. "I…I…this is amazing."

Mikoto grinned kindly.

"Glad you like it, dear. So, let's go get your bags."

They went all the way downstairs, all the way back, and put her things down on the floor.

Mikoto gave the rosette a quick hug and said, "You can move whatever you want around in here. Okay?"

"Okay."

"Fantastic," Mikoto smiled, "I'll call you for lunch a little later."

And with that, she left Sakura's room, shutting the door quietly behind her.

Sakura collapsed onto the bed.

She was suddenly incredibly tired.

She smiled lightly, to herself, and closed her eyes.

And just then, she heard a door open.

Sakura jerked up and stared at the glass door, which was now open.

And there was a boy standing there.

He was tall, had black hair and dark eyes.

Those dark eyes were currently peering at Sakura.

And then he smirked.

"Who are you?" was all Sakura could manage.

"Guess."

"What? Why? What are you doing in my room?"

"I was out on the balcony."

He shut the door and pulled an umbrella from behind his back.

Sakura stood up, glaring.

Right then, he looked her up and down, registering that she was wearing black cargo pants and a green T-shirt, and she, in turn, saw that he was wearing a dark long sleeve shirt with plaid shorts.

His eyes stopped on her hair.

And then he smirked his smirk.

"How on earth do you have pink hair?"

She flushed.

"I don't know! Get out of my room. Now. Whatever your name is."

He shrugged, then walked across her floor and out of the room.

She followed him over and locked the door behind him.

"And by the way," his muffled voice came from the other side, "It's Uchiha Sasuke."

**A/N: HI! So tell me how it was! REVIEW! Please. **


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N: Heys! Thank you to everyone who reviewed chapter 2: gaarasracoon, animefan0000012345, Soaring Innocence, and Rose Tiger. THANK YOU!**

**Disclaimer: I DO NOT OWN NARUTO! If I did, there'd be more romance for Kiba. **

Sasuke's footsteps faded away.

Sakura ran a hand through her short hair and turned back to face her room.

_Well, I guess sitting on the balcony in the rain under an umbrella isn't that bad, _she thought, _I'd probably do the same thing._

The sudden tiredness left; she felt suddenly energized and pumped up.

Definitely not because of the raven-haired boy who, out of nowhere, appeared in her room from the balcony outside, with extremely good looks and a voice cool as ice—

_Ugh_.

She shook her head.

_Why did I just think that? _

Sakura put her hands on her hips and looked around the room. After thinking for a bit she started to unpack. Kneeling down in front of her green suitcase, she took out all her clothes (which mainly consisted of jeans, cargo pants, T-shirts, and hoodies) and put them in her dresser and closet. Some of her action figures and toys were at the bottom, and she arranged those on her desk. she pulled out her girl stuff and tooth brush and tooth paste and all that, and walked into the bathroom, flicking on the switch. She put everything in the correct places, then went back into her room. Her Viola went in the closet and then she put everything else in the places where they needed to be. Her backpack went into the closet, too.

And then she opened up her red bag and took out her books, filing them into the slots on her desk.

Beneath the books, however, were some special objects.

They were old things of her parents, her mom's old bracelet with the charms, an ancient sewing kit, and one of her father's ties. There was a picture, too. It was of her mom and dad and her, smiling and sitting by the bride and groom at a wedding.

She swallowed hard and put them in the top drawer of her dresser.

Sakura always tried not to think about how they died too much, it was too painful, too horrible to dwell on. But now, all of it hit her full force, leaving her old house behind, her old school, old friends, moving here, to this new place, this rich neighborhood, this amazing house, this amazing room—

She lay down on the bed, feeling slightly nauseated.

And everything came back.

It was on the way back from that wedding.

The car crash.

The night.

The smoke.

The blood –the two dead bodies.

The police sirens.

The ambulance.

The terrified, sobbing Sakura in the back seat.

The front of the car was smashed, fire blazing up out of it.

Wind blew.

People shouting.

The hospital.

The white walled rooms.

The man coming up to Sakura, telling her that her parents were gone.

Dead.

Expired.

The funeral.

The coffin, the flowers, the graves.

The orphanage, those mean kids.

Anko.

Moving.

New people.

Mikoto, Fugaku, Itachi—

Sasuke.

It was all just way too much, way too fast.

Outside, thunder boomed.

She was crying now, her brand new pillow soaking up with salty, angry tears.

It was all his fault, that stupid drunk truck driver who ran into their car.

Because of him.

For an hour of excitement and adrenaline, he destroyed her entire life.

Sakura gritted her teeth and wrenched her eyes shut, trying to control that encroaching, furious hurt.

And slowly, she drifted off into a troubled, maddening sleep.

~3 HOURS LATER~

There was a knock at Sakura's door. It was steady, bored, but loud enough to wake someone up.

Like our pink haired hero, for example.

She sat up and rubbed the sleep out of her eyes.

"Yes?" She croaked, standing up.

There was a pause.

"Mom sent me," it was Sasuke's voice. "we're gonna be eating in a couple minutes. Care to join?"

Sakura cleared her throat.

"Yeah. I care."

Silence. 

She walked into the bathroom, in the darkness, and washed her face.

Cold water met hot tears.

Crying again.

_Really, Sakura, _she told herself, _get it together. Calm down. _

She stepped out, back into her room, and looked out the window.

The rain was still pouring down, lightning flashing in the distance.

She took a deep breath and reached for the doorknob.

Thunder crackled LOUD.

The walls shook slightly.

Sakura swung open the door, and looked up into the calm, pale face of the youngest Uchiha.

"I shall be your escort tonight."

She stared at him.

"Today," he added, "This afternoon."

Sakura shut the door behind her.

"Right."

He thrust his hands into his pockets and turned around.

She followed Sasuke across the floor and down the steps, trying to steady her unsteady heartbeat.

Unsuccessfully.

She wanted to start a conversation—Sakura was never one to sit in an awkward silence.

"So, I thought your mom was supposed to call me for lunch."

_Ah, God. What a stupid thing to say. _

Sasuke stopped and turned around, now looking up at her, seeing as how she was two steps above him.

She flushed.

Why did his eyes have to be so intense?

"Do you have a problem with me escorting you?"

Sakura grinned.

"Not at all. Sorry if I...uh… damaged your honor."

Sasuke shrugged and turned back around.

_I'm such an idiot!_ She yelled inside her head.

"She _was_ supposed to call you." He was saying, " Until she decided that Sasuke needed to get to know Sakura. And I have to show you downstairs before we eat."

They went down the steps, and Sasuke led her to the one hallway by the front door. They walked all the way down it, when Sasuke stopped at the door at the end. He turned the knob and pushed it open.

A ballroom.

A huge, amazing ballroom.

The floor was polished wood.

There was a piano in the corner, and a beautiful crystal chandelier hanging from the ceiling. Most of the roof was pure glass, so they could see the rain falling down and the great rumbling clouds. It was still dark.

"This is where we have dances every once in a while." Sasuke was saying. "And it's old dancing. Like, the waltz and ballroom stuff."

Sakura nodded.

He shut the door.

And then they proceeded back down the hallway.

Sasuke explained everything, this was this and that was this, this room was used for this, and all the like.

They finally went into the dining room, where Mikoto had a great feast set up on the long table.

It smelled awesome.

There were mash potatoes and fruits and tater-tots and rolls and drinks and soup and everything.

Besides at parties, it was more food than Sakura had ever seen in her life.

Fugaku was sitting at the end, Mikoto took a seat next to Itachi—

Which left Sakura sitting next to Sasuke.

Part of her was thrilled, part of her was sick with fear.

She was going to mess up somehow—she just knew it.

Sasuke pulled Sakura's chair out for her, and she flushed and sat.

He seated himself at her side.

Meanwhile…

Itachi grinned his foxy, sly grin at Sasuke.

"Why, how very gentlemanly of you," he coughed oh-so- discreetly at Sasuke.

Sasuke sent a stony glare at his older brother's obnoxiously cheerful grin.

"Shut up, Itachi," he hissed ever-so-indiscreetly.

"That's enough," Fugaku said, crossing his arms over his chest.

He glared daggers at both his children.

"I hate you," Sasuke mouthed at his older brother.

Itachi winked.

"Okay, everyone!" Mikoto smiled, clapping her hands, "Let's begin! This lunch is to welcome Sakura! Enjoy, dear."

They passed the plates around and passed the rolls around.

They passed everything around.

And then they ate.

But _of course_, something went wrong.

Everyone was eating in silence, until Haruno Sakura made one, tiny, teensy little mistake.

Well, a big mistake, really.

**A/N: Hi everyone! Please Review! PLEASE! I need to know how I'm doing. Is it good? Bad? Plus, reviews make me want to update sooner, so review!**


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N: Hi! Thanks to everyone who reviewed! Reviews totally brighten my day. Okay! My friend brought up a really important point after reading this story, a point I'd never have thought of before. Sasuke and Itachi don't act as "dark" as they're supposed to. That is **_**so**_** true. After some thinking, I decided that Sasuke acted differently because of the fact that his parents were still alive, Itachi didn't massacre the Uchiha clan, and everyone is happy.**

**But seeing as how this doesn't really happen, I had to do some awkward thinking.**

**What would the brothers be like if they grew up with their parents and everything was normal?**

**I was in total, insane control.**

**And THAT'S why Itachi is an extremely hyper overly cheerful 20 year old with dreams of musical glory. Sasuke isn't as cold and dark as how he is in the anime and manga, so I just loosened him up a bit. A lot. He isn't as indifferent, and as you'll see in this chapter, he strives hard to please his parents. **

**Disclaimer: I DO NOT OWN NARUTO. **

So Sakura was cutting nervously into her baked potato (another one of the marvelous dishes on the table). She wasn't exactly sure how to do this, the entire affair of taking a knife, slicing through the potato, then picking it up with fork or spoon was difficult.

Extremely so.

Even more than usual because this potato was really hard.

There was a loud cackle of thunder, and then a flash of lightning.

And just then, the lights went out.

Everyone froze except for Sasuke.

"Don't panic, kids," Mikoto said, "its okay."

"Um." That was Itachi.

It was pitch black, except for the weak gray sunlight coming in through the morning room and the few windows.

An exceptionally loud boom of thunder, and Sakura almost jumped; her elbow slid off the table, knocking her knife to the ground.

She heard it clatter and hit something.

10 seconds later-

Sasuke slowly turned to look at her sidelong.

His onyx orbs flashed Sharingan red for a moment.

"Oh." Sakura stammered, "Uh—sorry. Was that your foot?"

Sasuke's eyes said yes it was indeed his foot, idiot.

She blinked.

He sighed then smirked lightly, (no one could see it) facing front again.

"Don't worry about it."

"Er—okay."

Well, there was no way she was getting her knife.

The lights flickered back on.

There was some nervous laughter, and they resumed their eating.

But Sakura was without a knife to cut her baked potato.

She looked around for something to cut it with, but to no avail. There were only five placemats and 5 sets of forks, spoons, and knives. She wasn't about to lean over and ask someone if she could use their knife.

No way.

She bit her lip. Just then, Itachi's dark eyes met her emerald ones.

"Somethin' wrong?" He asked.

"Nope. Nothing at all."

Sakura looked at the dry baked potato. If she left the whole thing when she hadn't even started eating, she'd waste food. They'd think she was an ungrateful little brat without any sense of respect or politeness. And the food itself looked really good, too.

She sighed.

Taking up the spoon, the rosette gripped it tightly in her right hand.

She started cutting viciously into the hard baked potato. She thought she had a piece separated enough, when suddenly it wouldn't budge. It was stuck.

That's when Sakura made her mistake.

She gritted her teeth and drove in harder, pushing down, then jerking up.

You can see where this is going, right?

When she yanked the spoon up, trying to free the chunks of baked potato—

Turns out the chunks of baked potato wanted to fly.

The lumps went up.

Everyone stared as they flew high into the air, then started coming down.

One went into Fugaku's drink.

Another landed on his head.

The third went into Sasuke's plate, and the last fell in Itachi's lap.

For a second, no one did anything.

Then Sakura jumped up.

"Augh!" She cried, "I'm so sorry! I didn't mean to!"

There was a flash of lightning, and the lights flicked off again.

"No, dear," Mikoto said quickly, "it's fine! I think I made a mistake in the baking. The potato's are really hard—"

"No!" Sakura shouted, her eyes ready to stream tears, "You're lying! Please stop it! I'm sorry! This is my fault! I _always_ mess up! I'm so sorry!"

She spun 'round.

"No, Sakura!" Itachi said, "wait!"

Sakura made her way across the polished wood and ran up the stairs.

There was a slam as she went into her room.

Fugaku sighed in depressed irritation and swiped the potato lump off of his head.

"Oh no." Mikoto panicked. "Someone has to go talk to her! Fugaku and I can't do it, we're adults. Itachi? Sasuke? It has to be one of you two."

Sasuke picked up the lump of potato from out of his plate and put it on a napkin.

Itachi pushed the lump of potato out of his lap and onto the floor.

Neither looked all too excited to be involuntarily volunteered.

And then a thought struck Itachi.

"Sasuke should do it."

Said Uchiha looked up.

"Me? Why _me?"_

"Because you guys are almost the same age, little brother," Itachi said, his eyes narrowing and mouth curling into his foxy grin, "and you're obviously the _closest _to our new foster _sister."_

Sasuke shot him a death glare.

"Dear," Mikoto said, walking over and putting her hand on his shoulder, "Itachi's right. You and Sakura are pretty much the same age, and I think she'll listen to you."

"How do you figure that?"

"I don't know, Sasuke. I just do."

"But mom—" he protested.

Mikoto gave him a look.

"Fine," Sasuke muttered , "whatever."

Fugaku stared coldly at his youngest child.

"Be more respectful to your mother, Sasuke."

He said it quietly but so viciously that Sasuke stood and bowed his head.

"Sorry mom."

"It's fine dear," Mikoto said, "don't worry. Go talk to Sakura. And I think now would be a good time to give her the gifts, okay?"

He nodded, turned around and started walking away—

When Itachi sprang up and followed him.

When they were out of earshot of their parents, Itachi put his elbow on Sasuke's shoulder and leaned down.

Hard.

Sasuke frowned but figured Itachi wouldn't have followed him if it wasn't to say something important.

"Just think of it this way, Sasuke," Itachi said, "mom is actually doing you a favor. If all goes well and you convince Sakura that she's not just some clumsy depressed little girl who makes mistakes and fails at life without a hope and full of despair, you'll win her heart and she'll love you for eternity."

Both of them stopped.

"Well…" Itachi considered slowly, "…maybe. Possibly. Eventually."

Sasuke shrugged his brothers arm off and rounded on him.

The only reason he was being _so _to this girl was because his mom told him that Sakura had been through a lot and needed as much kindness as possible.

But that didn't mean Uchiha Sasuke didn't have any interest in the feisty pink-haired kid.

He did, in fact.

But he would never have pulled out chairs for her or any gentlemanly stunt like that if not for his mother.

Sasuke managed an "Itachi you idiot get out of my life" through clenched teeth and started walking up the steps.

"She was crying, you know."

Sasuke turned to stare at his brother.

"What? When?"

Itachi pushed his hands into the pockets of his pants.

"Earlier today. I was on my way to mom and dad's room and I heard her."

Sasuke exhaled.

_Great._

Outside, the rain stopped.

"Just want to let you know that this is serious," his brother said, "don't screw it up. Try comforting her."

Sasuke nodded and made his way up the steps. He was actually kind of impressed and relieved that Uchiha Itachi had an actual heart somewhere underneath all that romance and music.

Then Itachi's voice rang out:

"You could try something like: 'I'll be here for you, my love!'" he said, "or 'I'll be here forever to wipe your tears away!' Or something."

Itachi was very smooth with the ladies.

What was that about impressed?

"Keep your lame romantic advice to yourself, Mr. Piano prodigy," Sasuke snarled.

Itachi grinned. "Whatever, brother. Just don't mess up."

"I'll try," Sasuke said more to himself than Itachi, and made his way to Sakura's room.

He pressed his ear to the door.

Nothing.

Sasuke slid his hand down and turned the knob.

The door swung open—

There was no one inside.

Sasuke looked around and his keen gaze caught that the balcony door was unlocked.

She was out there.

He took a step in, then stopped.

Oh.

He'd forgotten the gifts.

Spinning around, Sasuke went into the bonus room closet and dragged out the two big boxes full of gifts for Sakura from the Uchiha family. They were either from Mikoto, Fugaku, Itachi or Sasuke. Everything was hand-wrapped, hand-written, and hand-signed.

All due to some persuading and threats from Mikoto, of course.

And then Sasuke remembered something. It was one of Itachi's special gifts, but it was in Itachi's room. Sasuke ran into Itachi's room, picked up the present, and ran back. He picked up the boxes (they didn't have lids, so some of the presents were poking him in the face) and went into Sakura's room. He shut the door quietly with his foot and proceeded onto the balcony.

Sakura was there, sitting on the far left under an awning. She was hugging her knees to her chest.

She managed a soundless "Sasuke?"

He did his smirking smile and made his way over to her, sitting down and setting the boxes to his left.

For a time neither said anything.

The rain had stopped long ago; now the sky was a calm, sad, mellow dove gray. A breeze blew.

It was kind of chilly for summer.

As everyone knows, Sasuke doesn't talk much and can sit in silence for a long time without feeling awkward.

But Sakura, on the other hand—

She was sweating and her cheeks were flushed. Mainly because Sasuke was sitting so close to her. She'd never been this close to him before.

(Seeing as how she'd only been living at his house for a couple hours).

She shifted uncomfortably.

And right when she was about to start wringing her hands—

He turned his onyx eyes to her.

"Sakura," he sighed, choosing his words carefully, "…what happened at lunch, it doesn't matter. Everyone makes mistakes…and...uh…." For the first time ever, Uchiha Sasuke sounded cheesy. He cleared his throat. "You don't need to get upset over it, all right? No one's mad or—"

"You don't get it, Sasuke," Sakura said, shaking her head, "I _always_ do that. I always make really stupid mistakes when I'm not supposed to screw things up. I always end up messing up right when everything seems to be going right. I hate that. I speak without thinking and do idiotic things without thinking of the consequences."

He stared at her.

"And with me," she went on quickly, "it's not even the whole, 'do what your heart tells you' thing. I just do the first thing that comes to my _mind_. My heart is…so unsure. I don't even know how to feel. There's just too much anger inside, too much ticked off, confused hurt… completely clouding up my heart." Sakura said, turning away from him to stare straight ahead, to look without seeing. "There's just so much I don't even understand…" her voice dropped down to a whisper as she pulled her knees to her chest, "inside…I'm just...so… _lost._"

Just then, the sun came out.

And there was silence.

Sakura bit her lip and shut her eyes, making sure the tears wouldn't fall. She would never let herself cry in front of Sasuke, no way. A moment later, everything she just said came back to her,

Oh, snap.

She jerked her head up.

"Oh, my God! See! I ramble, too! I ramble about things I'm never supposed to tell anyone!"

She cried out in frustration and kicked the railing of the balcony, only hurting her socked foot in the process.

Right then, Sasuke turned to her; his jaw clenched.

"Sakura. I just…want to tell you that…"

His mind flicked back to Itachi. What should he say? 'I'll be here for you, my love? I'll be here forever to wipe your tears away?'

"R-really?" Sakura whispered.

Sasuke froze.

"What?"

"You'll really be here for me forever to wipe my tears away?"

Ah.

Crap.

"Wait. Did I just say all that out loud?"

She nodded.

Sasuke bit back a swear word and passed a hand over his face.

Stupid Itachi.

Stupid, stupid, _stupid _older brother!

If he hadn't told Sasuke all that mushy romantic junk he'd never had said anything this stupid!

AUGH!

_Itachi!_

This. Was. All. HIS fault.

"So will you?" Sakura asked.

She looked sincerely hopeful.

Sasuke tried not to grit his teeth and managed a half smile.

And he nodded.

"W-wow," Sakura stammered, her face going beet red. "That's amazing. Thank you so much, Sasuke."

"Anytime."

She grinned and turned her eyes to the sky. After a second, she said—

"Hey look. A rainbow."

There was a huge rainbow stretching across the sky, the spectrum of colors standing out against the gray sky.

Rainbows and romance…

It was like a picture perfect moment.

But it only lasted for, eh, 10 seconds right until—

"_Meow!"_

Their eyes snapped away from the sky and to the boxes.

Sasuke knew what it was, but Sakura—

"Did that box just meow?"

He laughed sadly and shook his head.

"All this stuff is for you," he said, "everyone got you different presents. And Itachi…well, Itachi got you …a someone." He pulled the special gift out of the box and pushed it over to Sakura. It was a carrying box, and around it was a ribbon with a little card that said "From: Itachi To: Sakura."

Sakura opened the little door and out came—

A cat?

"Meow!"

The kitty cat was bright orange with bright blue eyes. Around the neck was a string with a little tag which read: "Name- Naruto."

"Naruto?" Sakura asked, picking him up, "For me? Wow! He's adorable!"

"Yeah," Sasuke said half-heartedly, "he was sleeping this whole time and I think he just woke up."

"He's so cu-u-u-u-u-te!" Sakura grinned, hugging Naruto to her chest.

Sasuke knew otherwise.

**A/N: YES! Naruto is a CAT! Ha. I wanted to bring Naruto into this somehow, and decided I'd name the cat after him. PLEASE REVIEW! **


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N: Hello! Thanks to everyone who reviewed!**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto. **

They'd had Naruto for about two weeks now, training him and getting him used to the house. He was the definition of cuteness, a fuzzy, furry, innocent, little orange kitty cat.

Or so Sasuke thought.

He was actually coming to tolerate Naruto, he kind of even started liking him—

Until he snuck into Sasuke's room one night and hacked his bed to pieces.

Sheets, blankets, pillows—all a pile of shreds in the morning.

He did the same thing five. Days. In. A. _row._

Itachi refused to take back the cat and said he'd train Naruto to be good.

Eventually.

That was almost a week ago.

Naruto seemed to be behaving well now, but… you could never really be sure what was going on in that little mind of his.

Sasuke didn't tell any of this to Sakura.

"Go Itachi!" Sakura laughed, putting Naruto in her lap then reaching for the boxes. She pulled out to big bags from the first box. These bags were labeled "From: Mikoto To: SAKURA!"

They were full of clothes. Clothes and shoes and heels and tons of other girly stuff like that. After digging around some, Sakura found a small velvet box. She blinked at it, then lifted the lid.

Inside was a silver necklace with a star pendant carved out of a pure emerald, it was studded with diamonds on the pointy parts. It glittered and shimmered and reflected weak green light across her lap when she held it up to catch the rays of the sun. There were so many facets, so many twinkling, lovely lights laughing through the pendant.

"Wow…" She whispered, "it's…so pretty…"

Her eyes were wide and her lips were parted slightly; she looked completely and truly amazed that this was for _her. _She'd never had any piece of jewelry, let alone anything this gorgeous, before.

Sasuke sighed a little from the look on her face. This poor, naïve, little, innocent girl. He'd seen things ten times as pretty, ten times as expensive. Sure, the necklace was pretty costly and beautiful, and Mikoto had got it for Sakura precisely because of its beauty, but there were so many things that were more exquisite than this little jewel.

Sakura put it back in the case and dropped it into the bag. She put the bags back into the box and pushed it over to her left. Naruto meowed, irritated, then jumped onto the box. She petted him. He stretched, purred, and settled down.

She pulled the second box towards her. This one was smaller.

Lying on the top was a small something wrapped in light blue gift wrap. There was no label. She tore off the paper and it revealed to be a wallet. It was black with a silver plaid design on the front and back. She opened it.

Money.

There was money inside. Maybe 200 dollars in 20, 10, and 5 dollar bills. Sakura's mouth went kind of dry. A little piece of paper had fallen out when she opened it. She picked it up and read: "Sakura. Use this as you wish. From: Fugaku."

Sakura tucked the paper into one of the slots.

Sasuke watched as she closed it and put it back in the box.

The next thing she lifted up out of the box was wrapped in bright orange paper with yellow polka dots. There was another label that said: "To Sakura From Itachi!"

Sakura laughed quietly.

Sasuke smirked. She was going to like this one.

She ripped off the paper and held up a soft, light green sweater with purple stripes going across it. On the back was the Kanji for "Cherry Blossom." In black.

Sakura might've started shrieking.

She hugged it to her chest.

"Just to let you know," Sasuke said, "he had someone personalize that."

"Really?"

"Yep. He copied my idea for the whole 'cherry blossom' thing."

Sakura quirked an eyebrow.

"Your idea?"

Sasuke nodded, then motioned to the last object in the box.

It was a cylindrical something wrapped in black paper. It was almost 12 inches in height.

Obviously Sasuke's gift, seeing as how there weren't any other unopened presents in the box. Sakura put down Itachi's sweater and reached for the last thing. It was heavy in her hands, and she could feel coolness through the paper. She gripped it tightly.

She looked up, sidelong at Sasuke.

He raised his eyebrows, as if to say: "Well?"

Sakura tore off the paper.

She was wrong, it wasn't cylindrical—it was an octagonal prism made of glass. Inside of it water was filled almost to the top, floating around inside the water were pink, glass cherry blossom flowers. There were many of them, some at the top, some at the bottom, some swimming around in the middle. There were tiny diamonds sparkling around inside, too. The water was so clear, everything was so clean and just so…

It was so beautiful.

She turned it upside down when she noticed something. On the bottom, there, carved into the glass… "For Sakura. – Sasuke."

"The cherry blossom…W-wow…" she said, looking up the boy next to her. "This is amazing. Thank you Sasuke."

He gave her one of his rare smiles.

She looked down at his gift again.

A breeze blew.

"Itachi did copy your idea. But I guess it's okay. And by the way…" Sakura said, "how'd you even carve this into the glass?" She pointed at the bottom where it was addressed to her from Sasuke.

"With a knife."

"Oh. Right…Can I take this stuff to my room?"

She put the wallet and scarf back into the smaller box and gently laid Sasuke's gift on top.

She tried to get Naruto to get back into his carrying box, but he refused, for some reason. He just sat on top of the one he was already on.

She shrugged.

Sasuke and Sakura picked up the boxes and made their way back into Sakura's room. They set everything down on her bed. Naruto meowed again and made himself comfortable on her pillow. Sasuke closed and locked the balcony door and slid to the floor, kind of bored. Well, he'd talked to her, they had made an alliance, and everything was all right now. So should he just leave?

He wondered about these things as the rosette put her gifts away.

Sakura took the glass prism and set it on top of her dresser.

She put the bags of clothes in her closet and folded Itachi's sweater into her dresser, along with the wallet. Her jewelry case went in there, too, probably until she decided when she was going to wear the necklace. She shut the drawer.

Right then, a thought struck Sasuke.

"Hey," he said, "My mom hasn't shown you the third floor yet, has she?"

Sakura turned around.

"Uh, no. Third floor?"

Sasuke nodded, stood, and shoved his hands into his pockets.

He looked so cool right then, Sakura thought, his tall strong figure outlined against the gray sky outside, hands thrust, bored, into pockets. Onyx eyes looking straight at her, dark bangs lying gently against his cheeks.

But then again, Uchiha Sasuke _always_ looked cool.

She flushed.

He walked up to her, smirking his smirk.

"So shall I show you the next floor?" He asked.

"Uh. Sure. What's up there anyway?"

"You'll see."

_Another dumb thing to say!_ Sakura roared mentally.

Roared.

Since the lights were never on, she didn't flick them off as they walked out of the room. She paused at the doorway, looking back at her cat.

"Naruto? Are you coming with?"

Sleepy "Meow."

Guess not.

Sasuke led her across the bonus room and into…his own room?

He stopped then, making Sakura run into his back.

She flushed and blinked up again.

Sasuke tried to hide his smirk when he saw the color rise in her cheeks.

"What?" Sakura asked.

"You never finished lunch. Are you still hungry?"

"Oh. No."

"All right then."

She followed him into his room and he closed the door.

Sakura blinked as it shut.

"Um? Sasuke? Why are we in your room?"

Sasuke walked past her and slid open his closet door. He pushed some clothing that was hanging aside, and stepped into it.

It was bigger than Sakura would have thought, bigger than hers.

Sasuke walked to the back of it and pulled down a large fan from the wall.

Behind the fan was a door.

It was a regular sized door, made of wood, had a handle and hinges and everything.

But it was in a closet.

"We're in my room because…"

He stood back and opened the door.

There was a short hallway, and at the end was a staircase.

"…it's how you get to the third floor."

**A/N: Please review! PLEASE!**


	6. Chapter 6

**A/N: Thanks to everyone who reviewed!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto. **

"I…see." Sakura said.

Sasuke reached into the door and flicked a switch on the right which caused a lone lamp hanging from the ceiling to turn on, glowing eerie yellow. It showed off the cobwebs and dust and old floorboards. A big spider crawled across the floor and onto the wall. Sakura was weighing the possibility of getting Naruto and bringing him with them. Maybe he'd eat spiders.

_Did Naruto eat spiders?_

_We could ask him to. _

_Actually, that'd be kind of mean. Force a cat to eat bugs. _

_(Besides, the spiders were here first. It wouldn't be proper to barge into their home and murder everyone. Especially when they weren't disturbing anyone.) _

_Maybe he was in a secret alliance with spiders. _

_Maybe he was friends with spiders. _

_Maybe he'd scare away rats._

_Were there rats? _

_How big were they?_

_Do they ever scratch on this door at night?_

_How did Sasuke stand that?_

_How did he tolerate that?_

_Why do rats make me nervous?_

_Why couldn't we leave in peace?_

_Man and animal?_

_Why couldn't we cope?_

_Why am I so confused?_

"Right then." Sasuke said, holding out his hand, "shall we go?"

Sakura stared at him, then his hand, then at the hallway, at the spider, and back at Sasuke.

She twisted the bottom of her shirt around her finger.

"What?" Sasuke said.

He made his way back to Sakura.

"Don't you trust me?"

Sakura looked up at him, her face was burning.

His eyes posed the question, his hand was still out.

"Sure I trust you." Sakura said quickly. "I just don't trust that hallway. Or those stairs."

Sasuke smirked. "Yeah, well… it's better up there than it seems to be down here."

"What?"

"Just come on. You'll see."

Sakura hesitated, and then took his hand.

It was cool compared to her warm, sweaty one.

Sasuke turned away so she wouldn't see him smirking, dark eyes glinting with amusement.

Wow, she was so nervous, Sasuke thought.

_Quit having cruel thoughts like that!_

'What's cruel about that?'

_You're making fun of the fact that she's nervous because she's been around you._

Sasuke blinked, froze, then gritted his teeth.

'I'm not making fun of that fact.'

_Then what are you doing?_

'Nothing! Not that. Shut up and leave me alone.'

_I'm afraid that's not possible. _

Dang conscious.

Sasuke led Sakura to the door and stepped through, both of them now under the low ceiling of the hallway. He closed the door. Didn't exactly want spiders in his room.

Sakura shot a weary glance at the big spider.

They walked down it, then slowly up the stair case. Sasuke was pretty tall, so he had to duck a little as he climbed it. Sakura was still behind him, gripping his hand tightly.

It was a pretty tall staircase.

When they did reach the top, there was a landing to the left. It was completely dark now.

Sasuke led her to the left, then stopped abruptly, so she ran into him.

She bet he was doing this stuff on purpose.

Sakura was glad it was dark, because she felt her face going red.

"The third floors pretty boring." Sasuke said.

"So then why are we—"

"Fourth floor. And what's above it."

"Ah."

He pulled her over to the left, and suddenly they were going up another staircase. This one was spiral, and steeper. Around and around and around until they reached the top. There was another landing, and a door. Light escaped from the bottom of it.

And Sasuke pushed it open.

Sunlight hit them full in the face, almost blinding them as he led her down another hallway with huge windows lining the sides. Sakura barely had the time to gape or gasp or anything because Sasuke pulled her down it pretty fast. They went to the end of it and Sasuke pushed open the door. There were two steps they went up, and he pushed up a metal hatch.

They were on the top of the house.

Sasuke pulled Sakura up after him.

"Behold. The roof."

He let go of her hot hand and she followed him over to the edge where they sat on an old blanket that was already there, looking over the low wall.

"This is amazing…" she whispered.

Sakura stared and stared. There weren't many houses around. It was just hills and forest for miles and miles. In the backyard there were things Sakura saw when she first came here, the well, the deck, lake, and patio. Past the forest, almost on the horizon but not quite, there was the city. It was huge, so different from Sakura's old city, old home. Sky scrapers rose up, buildings, parks, so many cars.

"What's the city called again?" Sakura asked.

"It's Konoha."

"Right. And I guess our schools over there?"

Sakura wanted to bang her head into a wall. What a stupid question. _Duh_ it was over there! Where else would it be?

"Yeah."

A breeze blew, ruffling their clothes and hair. By now the sky was half gray and half blue, the wind having blown the clouds farther away past the horizon.

Just then, Sakura heard a faint blearing horn.

She looked at Sasuke.

He pointed behind them, at the fields past the road and the few other houses, at a long railroad which stretched into the distance.

"There's a train…" he said, "Look. Here it is…"

And then the long, gray train came into view, speeding across the tracks, sounding its horn. They watched as it moved away, fast, Sakura followed it with her eyes until she couldn't see it anymore, when it went past the horizon. The sound a train made… it was like a mellow scream, she thought. A sad, bellowing, scream.

It disappeared.

Sakura twisted back around.

A flock of birds flew overhead.

Sakura blinked up at them as the breeze hit her face.

After a moment—

"I come here all the time," Sasuke started saying. "Whenever I want to get away. You get a balcony, Itachi gets a balcony, Mom and Dad get a balcony… and I get the roof. It's quite fair, when you think about it."

Sakura grinned over at him.

"Yeah."

And then:

"It must be really great out here alone, at night. Under the stars."

He nodded, turning his onyx eyes to her.

"Yeah. It's great. When you look up into the dark sky you realize that you're really just this…I dunno…this tiny little speck compared to…everything out there. It's hard to explain."

"No," Sakura said, "I get it."

Her emerald eyes met his.

He wasn't sitting that far away, but not as close as he was on the balcony. Sakura grinned again, at how perfect this moment was.

At the same time, they looked away.

Sakura put her elbows up on the wall, resting her chin on them.

She breathed in, then out.

"You know…it's always just been me, here, alone at night."

She nodded, not looking at him.

"Alone." She provided.

"Yeah…but I'm willing to share it."

Sakura's heart gave a trill.

"The stars are great and everything, but I'm sure they're greater when you're watching with someone else."

She smiled, barely able to contain her excitement.

A second later-

"So…is this an invitation?" she whispered.

Somewhere in the distance, a clock tower rang its bells.

"This is an invitation to a stargazing session. Tonight. Haruno Sakura," Sasuke said, turning to her, "would you care to join me?"

**A/N: HEYS! Please review! **_**Please!**_


	7. Chapter 7

**A/N: Hello everyone! Thanks to everyone who reviewed! You guys are awesome!**

**Just a note, I probably won't be updating until next Thursday because we're traveling. So, I'll try to make this chapter extra long to make up for the week I'm missing. Okay? All right.**

**Disclaimer: No. I'm not Masashi Kishimoto. I don't own Naruto. Got it?**

"It would be my pleasure."

He smirked, satisfied, and faced front again.

"When are we going to do it?" she asked.

Sasuke shrugged, considered a while, then said:

"Probably during dinner. We'll just eat out here."

"Will your parents let us?"

"Dad's going back to work in a little bit—he's in charge of the police force, just took a couple hours off today—so he won't be here…and… I think mom would."

Sakura was beyond thrilled, giddy with excitement.

After another moment—

"Do you wanna go back?" Sasuke said this.

She looked at him.

"We never told them we were up here. They're probably worried."

"…Yeah."

He stood up.

Sakura faltered to her feet.

Sasuke pushed his hands into his pockets.

This time, he gestured Sakura forward, ahead of him.

He followed her across the roof, the top of her head passing under his eyes. Sasuke closed the metal hatch and turned it so it was locked, going down the steps with Sakura. This time, she had a better look at the hallway with the big windows. It was almost like they were suspended above everything (except the roof). Sakura looked out of one, and noticed the sun starting to set. Lunch seemed like…so long ago…

They walked down it in silence.

Sakura cast a look behind her at Sasuke.

She tried to put her hands into pockets like he always did.

Her pockets were too small.

Of _course_, they were.

Sasuke allowed himself a chuckle.

He shut the other door behind him, and they were drenched in darkness, there was nothing but the thin line of light coming from under the door. Sakura stopped then at the first landing. The same, nameless fear gripped her again, the kind of fear she felt at the beginning, standing in front of the closet door. The darkness was so… so thick and—

What's that?

That shadow?

What is it? A monster? Is it coming this way? She could almost hear it's hungry footfalls coming up the stairs, the growling, snarling howl—

"I can't do this." She whispered suddenly, taking a step back.

Naturally, onto Sasuke's foot.

There was an almost silent sigh.

"Sure you can, Sakura."

He put a steadying hand on her lower back, nudging her slightly forward.

"There's nothing there. What are you afraid of?"

Shivers went up her spine as his palm lay flat against her back, his fingers lightly grazing her shirt.

_Why am I so scared? _

She could tell the spiral stair case was close, but the fact that she couldn't really see it unnerved her. And the monster? What happened to him?

_It's your imagination, Sakura! Wake up!_

She blinked, hesitated, then took a few weary steps ahead.

Sasuke was close behind.

She went further-

And she gasped as her foot fell onto air.

She was going about to go down, down, down, to her sad, unfortunate death at the bottom of a staircase in a guy's closet—

Sasuke yanked her back, his hand around her wrist.

"Whoah. Okay. Sorry. Not that far."

Sakura's heart hammered in her chest, as she stood there, knees shaking.

Sasuke spoke: "I think I'll take over now."

He stepped around her, his hand slipping down her wrist and to her palm. She gripped it tightly.

"I guess that's enough lessons in bravery for one day, huh?"

He led her calmly down the spiral staircase.

Sakura heard a small something crawl down the wall behind her.

She cringed and leaned in closer to Sasuke.

She'd never be able to lead, but following wasn't much funner, either.

Down.

Down.

Down.

"If you think this is bad," Sasuke said, "it'll be worse at night."

Yikes.

At night.

And just then, he stopped.

Sakura ran into him.

Her face was hot.

_He must seriously enjoy doing this to me!_

"But then again," he whispered, "…I _did_ promise I'd be here for you forever. So don't worry about it."

She was going to worry about it, but it made her feel better to have Sasuke by her side.

They were on the second landing now, climbing down the flight of stairs behind the closet door in Sasuke's room. Down again…

And then the lone lamp came into view.

Sakura was relieved.

Her steps became eager and faster.

Right when his socked feet came into contact with the floor of the hallway, he stopped.

She was a step above him.

This time, Sakura didn't just run into him, she knocked him over, so that he was flat on the ground, Sakura on top.

They fell with a thud.

Sprawled over Uchiha Sasuke in a closet.

Shoot.

Sasuke coughed, his face in the dust of the old floor boards.

Sakura scrambled backwards and off of him.

She felt like cursing as she helped him up, hissing: "Confound it, Sasuke! _Why _do you always _stop _like that!"

He stood and brushed off his clothes—

Then turned and smirked at her.

"'Confound it?'"

"Shut up. I like saying that."

Sasuke shrugged then cleared his throat, saying:

"I stop when the need arises. When I have to say, ask, or do something dramatic and important. Or when I see a spider the size of Jupiter hanging from a light bulb."

Sakura snapped her eyes to the light.

There was a thin, almost invisible string of web attached to the bulb, and at the very bottom, resting peacefully and probably asleep, was a spider.

_Way_ bigger than the one she had seen when Sasuke first opened the door in the closet.

This one was dark orange with big fangs.

Probably harmless.

_Probably. _

Sasuke and Sakura just went around.

They put their backs flat against the wall and skirted around the spider.

Sakura hopped out of the door and out of the closet.

Almost too fast.

Sasuke flicked the switch off, causing the spider to stir slightly, and stepped into his closet. He shut the door and turned a lock Sakura hadn't noticed before.

He picked up the fan that was leaning against the wall and hung it back up, so that the door was covered completely.

He pushed his clothes back aside, then stepped out into his room, sliding the closet door shut.

He thrust his hands into his pockets.

Figures.

Both of them were covered in dust, with pebbles and grit on their socks.

Sasuke stretched, then, flicking his bored, onyx eyes at Sakura.

"I'm gonna shower."

"Uh, okay. I think I'll take one, too."

"All right. I might as well show you how to work the shower thing, then."

He walked across his floor and out of his room, Sakura following close behind.

When they reached her door, he stopped.

Sasuke took off his socks before entering Sakura's room.

They were, after all, dirty.

Sakura wondered why she didn't take _her _socks off when she was in his room.

Well, he didn't take his own socks then.

Regardless, she took her socks off now.

Naruto was still on the bed. He meowed, loud, and jumped onto the floor. He pranced out of the room.

Bare foot, Sakura followed Sasuke into her bathroom.

Sasuke got into the tub while Sakura kneeled on the floor on the other side.

He crouched down and pointed at the one of the two handles on the wall.

"This ones to turn it on. Just pull it out, then turn it to the right or left for temperature."

She nodded.

He jerked his thumb at the other one.

"By spinning this around, you can change how the water comes out of the shower head. Like relaxing, or strong, or force, or…whatever."

He looked at her.

"Good?"

Sakura reached over and put her hand on the first handle.

"Yep, I got it. I think. So you just pull it out and…"

"Yeah," Sasuke said, "but don't do it right no—"

And the water came down.

It was on the 'strong' option.

The shower head shot ferociously cold water, whip-like water straight at Sasuke's forehead.

Sakura gaped and leaned over the handle to stop the water—

Her fingers grappled the second handle, and she spun it around:

Now the water was on force.

Which was basically the same thing as 'strong' except it had a wider radius.

Sasuke swore, loud, and squinted through the water, reaching for the first handle, and it turns out Sakura was reaching for that handle right then, too—

His hand closed around hers.

Both of them pushed forward to shut the thing off, (Sasuke using a reasonably greater force than Sakura, of course).

And the water stopped.

For a second Sasuke just sat there, panting.

And then he pulled his hand away when he realized hers was under it.

Oops.

Sakura slowly drew her hand away, clenched her fists, put them on her knees, and stared at the floor.

She looked like she was about to cry.

"God, I'm so sorry, Sasuke! I told you, didn't I? I always make these stupid mistakes—"

"Its fine, Sakura." He said, pushing wet hair out of his eyes, "at least I won't have to take a shower anymore."

Actually, he felt worse than before, because his clothes were sticking to him now, and all the dust and stuff was flowing in a little stream down Sakura's bath tub.

He was probably going to take another, _real_, shower in a minute.

She managed a weak, watery smile at him.

He stood and pushed his hands into his pockets.

Sasuke stepped over the tub wall and started walking away, when he paused at the doorway.

The raven haired boy jerked his thumb at the bathroom closet.

"Towel's are in there."

He turned his onyx eyes to the rosette.

"Okay?"

"Okay." She said it not looking at him.

Sasuke sighed lightly, then left her room.

Sakura jumped up right when she heard her door close. She walked into her closet, selected a pair of black jeans and a loose-fitting blue T-shirt with a logo on it. These two came from Mikoto's bag of gifts. She grabbed clean socks and underwear and all that, and zipped into the bathroom, locking the door.

She took a long shower, nice and refreshing.

She stepped out of the bathroom when she was done, putting her dirty clothes in the hamper which she discovered in her closet.

She felt so clean.

Outside the sun had completely set, it was dark now, completely so.

Sakura was thrilled.

Just a little bit longer.

She ran a hand through her damp, pink, hair.

Then she went into her closet and reached for the velvet box Mikoto had given her.

Flipping open the lid, she pulled the silver necklace out of the box.

The emerald star hung there, shining and twinkling.

She unclasped it, then reconnected it around her neck.

There was a knock at her door.

Sakura bit her lip to keep the grin from splitting her face open.

She dropped the necklace down under her shirt and put the box back into the bag.

"Yes?" she asked.

There was a pause from whoever was outside her door. And then:

"Dinner time."

She hear Sasuke smirking.

In a few minutes, they were walking down the steps to the dining room.

Sasuke was wearing plaid red and black shorts with a white, long sleeve T-shirt, but the sleeves were rolled up.

In a moment, they were in the dining room.

Mikoto and Itachi were putting plates and things down on the table.

Fugaku was at work.

They looked up when Sakura and Sasuke entered.

Naruto appeared from behind a couch. He stretched and flounced over to have his meal on the floor.

"Is everything all right?" Mikoto asked, smiling, looking at Sakura.

There was a flicker of concern in her eyes.

She was talking about lunch.

"Oh, yeah, mom, it's all good."

Good thing Sakura spilled her guts to Sasuke.

Good thing Sasuke did the talking.

"Good, Good!" Mikoto said, resuming her work.

Itachi, however—

"So how'd it go, little brother?" he whispered, narrowing his eyes at Sasuke. "The talk?"

"I need you to _shut up, _Itachi_._"

"Went that well, huh?" he hissed, grinning.

Sasuke ignored him.

But just barely.

"Hey, mom…"

Mikoto looked up.

"Yes, dear?"

"Um—Are me and Sakura allowed to eat on the roof?"

Mikoto looked slightly taken aback.

"The roof?"

"Yes."

"Just to…eat?"

"And look at the stars," Sakura provided, "it's a stargazing session."

"Ooooh," Itachi said, "in that case, am I allowed to come—"

"No." Sasuke snapped.

Itachi grinned in his way, eyes narrowing.

"Sakura and Sasuke!" he commentated, "Alone! On the roof! Under the stars—"

"Shut. Up."

Sakura's face started burning at 'Alone.'

Good thing Sasuke's good at snapping at his brother.

Mikoto ignored Itachi.

"Well…I don't see why you can't." She said, "Just be careful up there. There are spiders and all sort of scary—"

She stopped when Sakura blanched.

"Oh. Right. Sorry." 

Sasuke and Sakura took some food, drinks and desert with them (cheesecake) and went back up the stairs.

"Have fun!" Mikoto called.

"Together!" Added Itachi.

Sasuke gritted his teeth.

They went all the way up into Sasuke's room, into the closet, moved the fan, opened the door, and—

Sasuke reached in and flicked on the light switch.

The spider was still there.

It woke up.

It made a weird, hissing sound, then crawled up the string of web and up the light bulb.

They were surprised it didn't get fried.

Sakura grabbed the telescope Sasuke asked her to bring along, then they went in and shut the door behind them.

Sasuke looked at Sakura.

"You ready?"

She swallowed hard. "Totally."

And they went up the stairs.

They weren't holding hands this time, seeing as how their arms were laden with food and other things.

Sakura was nervous and sweating, as she followed Sasuke up the stairs, to be swallowed by the same darkness again. She pushed the telescope up into her arms, then put her hand out and grabbed the back of Sasuke's shirt.

He paused slightly, but didn't say anything.

It gave her some comfort to know he was close.

They went up and up and up, left, up and around and around… through the door, and entered the hallway.

"Close your eyes." Sasuke said suddenly.

She did as told.

"Why?" she whispered.

"I don't want you to see what it looks like until we're out there."

She felt herself smile and go warm.

Inside she was shaking like a hummingbirds wing.

They went down it, then up a few steps, Sasuke turned the metal hatch and pushed it open.

Sakura felt a cool breeze on her face-

As they ascended onto the roof.

"Don't you dare look up," Sasuke muttered. "Wait for me."

And Sakura opened her eyes.

She let go of his shirt.

They walked out to the old blanket, and Sakura sat.

The sky was the darkest she'd ever seen it. And she didn't even look up yet. Down in the backyard, the lake sparkled with the dim light shooting up out of the fountain. The forest swayed in the wind, the soft breeze hitting their faces. Far away (really far away) past the trees, the city lights shone, definitely not as bright as the stars. The city was too far away too damage the view they had on the stars.

Sakura hoped.

Behind her, Sasuke was getting the food all organized.

Sakura twisted around to look behind her at the fields and meadow. And right then, she heard the same, faint mellow scream again. The train came back, zipping across the tracks. It's light was on now, making it look so awesome. It's blearing horn sounded as it skidded away. Sakura turned back to face the front. She stared at the horizon.

Sasuke sat down beside her now, he had two plates with the same amount of food in them. He brought the drinks, too. Sakura picked up her plate and started eating.

"Now can we look up?" she asked.

"Not yet." Sasuke muttered between mouthfuls.

They ate in silence.

A cool breeze blew.

It was almost completely dark, save for the lights of the city on the far horizon.

"Now?"

"No."

"Come on, Sasuke! When?"

"Just wait. We have to do it at the same time."

Sakura grinned.

And they finished their food, along with the cheesecake desert.

She lifted her cup to her lips, drinking her water.

And then Sasuke said:

"Okay. Now. Just close your eyes and lay back."

And that's exactly what she did.

She heard Sasuke lay down over to her left somewhere.

"Okay. Open."

That's exactly what Sakura did.

And it was breathtaking.

There were so many stars, Oh, my God. Tiny pinpoints of light way up there. There were so many. She couldn't even make out any constellations there were so many. She saw some of them twinkling, but all of them were silver dots spread out upon a black, velvety night. The occasional light purple, thin, wispy cloud passed by, but besides that…

"Oh, my God…" Sakura whispered

The sky was darker and lighter in some places, a background to the lovely glittering of the stars.

And they just lay there.

Just staring.

So much beauty…

Sasuke and Sakura said nothing for a long time.

And then, the same clock tower rang it's bells, far away.

The wind blew.

They lay there for a good 25 minutes.

And Sasuke sat up.

"Do you want to look through the telescope now?"

"Sure," Sakura said.

He reached for the box and assembled it quite fast, propping up the stand.

Sasuke got up then bent down, over it, spun the eyepiece around a bit, then pointed the body towards a particular direction. He looked up at the sky, then back in the lenses. Sakura saw him grin lightly and exhale.

"Look at this."

He stepped back and gestured her forward.

She stood and leaned in to the eyepiece, shutting her left eye. She peered in, and… darkness?

"No, like this." Sasuke muttered, and nudged her chin slightly to the left so she had a better angle and—

There was a really bright something right there. It was almost yellow… could that be…

"It's Venus," Sasuke said.

Sakura's chin felt hot where his hand was a moment before.

"It's beautiful," Sakura said, straightening up. "All of this," she waved her hand through the sky, "is…amazing."

"Sure is."

Sasuke leaned back over the eyepiece, moving it around some.

The wind blew.

Sakura stared back up at the sky, soon getting lost in the wonder.

She sat down in front of the wall, putting her elbows up on it.

"Thanks for inviting me to your stargazing invitation, Sasuke."

She said, staring straight ahead.

He sat next to her.

"My pleasure."

He sat closer than on the balcony so long ago, his shoulder grazing hers.

He blinked up at the sky.

"Oh, look. A shooting star. Huh. This is kind of perfect."

Sakura looking up, her mouth slightly open—

And she saw it.

Streaking across the stars, a bright tail of fire lacing out from behind.

And just like that, it sped away, past the horizon.

The first time she'd ever seen a shooting star.

After about half an hour of staring and looking up, Sasuke said:

"So, we can stay out here for a little longer, or we can go back, or…what do you want to do?"

"Fly."

Sakura turned to him, emerald eyes glinting with starlight.

"I want to fly."

**A/N: Hi everyone! So I won't be updating until next Thursday! Hopefully, I'll write then. But please review! **


	8. Chapter 8

**A/N: Heys! I'm back! Thanks if you reviewed!**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto.**

Sakura sat back, laying her hands in her lap.

Sasuke looked away at the sky, leaning back and laying his palms flat on the roof.

There was silence for a little while.

Then:

"I used to wish for that, too," he muttered flatly, "until I realized there was someone out there who needed it more."

Sasuke brought his gaze down and right, at Sakura.

"And…I think I found that someone."

She went warm and bowed her head so that Sasuke couldn't see her face.

She felt the smile on her lips.

Sakura closed her eyes.

The clock tower rang its bells.

Suddenly there were bird calls, and a moment later, a crow soared over head.

The Rosette brought her head back up, and they watched the avian go.

Sasuke breathed in the sweet night air.

Silence.

Out of nowhere, Sakura remembered the necklace she was wearing. She pulled it out from under her blue T-shirt, holding it up by the silver chain. The starlight passed through it, dancing with the emerald jewel.

Wind blew.

Sasuke reached out and touched the bottom tip of the star with his finger, then locked eyes with Sakura.

"It fits you."

Sakura grinned as Sasuke let the necklace hang freely from her hand.

"Well, your mom has good taste."

"True."

She let the necklace fall.

And right then, a slow, beautiful violin began to play. It came from behind them, far off in the fields. Both of them turned around to see who was playing it. After some peering, Sakura made out a shadowed figure carrying the instrument, walking along side a little road in the fields. The tune he played was calm, relaxing, but… sad, in a way.

"That's kind of interesting," Sakura said, "a guy walking through a field playing a violin. It must be fun."

Sasuke nodded.

They watched the man follow the road until he disappeared from view.

Just like the train before.

Just like the shooting star.

Just like the crow.

The two teens turned back around to face each other, Sakura blushing when Sasuke's raven locks brushed her pink hair.

She looked away, but Sasuke just smirked, musing random things to himself.

And then he noticed something.

"Sakura, look up."

She did as told, "Why?"

"There's an eyelash on your cheek."

She felt herself go redder than before.

"Oh," she said, swiping at her face.

"Wrong side." Sasuke murmured, looking smug.

"Ri-i-i-i-ght."

Sakura started wiping at her other cheek, but was quite missing the target.

Sasuke sighed and reached out to brush it off right when—

The metal hatch of the roof clanged open with a BANG.

Both of them spun around to stare.

And Itachi poked his head up out of the hatch.

"What do you want?" Sasuke all but snarled, glaring at his older brother, "I said you couldn't come."

"It's Dad,"

Itachi said flatly,

"He got shot."

Sakura froze, but Sasuke jumped up.

"What? How? Is he—"

"He's in the hospital," Itachi cut in sharply, "and we're going. Now."

He ducked down, out of sight.

Sasuke grabbed Sakura's arm and pulled her up.

They left everything, the telescope, the plates, the cups—all of it.

They sprinted down the metal hatch and down the hallway. Sakura was in front of Sasuke, and she tried not to hesitate when they were swallowed by the darkness again. But she did.

She stopped.

It was pitch black, she couldn't see the stairs, she couldn't see anything.

_Be strong, Sakura._ Her mother's words came back to her out of the blue.

_Get it together._ She told herself.

She swallowed hard and took a step forward—

And Sasuke was in her way.

His dark eyes flashed red for a second, and then he took her hand. For the first time, there was clear alarm etched on his face.

He leaned forward so his face was inches from hers.

"It's okay if you're scared," he whispered, " because…you don't have to be brave now."

And he turned around and pulled Sakura down the stairs with him.

They went fast, faster than Sakura could've ever gone alone in a place so dark. Across the landing, down the steps, down, down, down…they burst out of the closet and into Sasuke's room. Sakura didn't even bother looking for the spider.

She closed the door behind her and they ran out of Sasuke's room, down the stairs—

Mikoto and Itachi were at the bottom, stepping into their shoes.

There were tears in Mikoto's eyes.

"Oh, Sasuke, Sakura! Come on! We need to go!"

Naruto jumped out from behind a sofa and meowed sadly, wondering what was wrong.

Sakura slipped on her sneakers and barely had time to explain what had happened, barely had time to think how she was going to explain something in English to a CAT, barely had time to do anything because Itachi pushed everyone out and locked the door behind him.

(He had a pair of the house keys.)

They ran to the huge car and everyone got in, slamming doors.

Mikoto started the car and drove extremely fast.

Itachi and Mikoto were sitting in the front.

The Rosette stared up out of the window, watching the stars blur together, the fields melting into one being.

She hadn't let go of Sasuke's hand.

"Mom," he said suddenly, "so what happened to Dad?"

Sobs racked Mikoto's throat as they sped down the road.

"His police squad went to arrest a man from a rundown house on the outskirts of the city. Your father went in first, but it was pitch black, and he couldn't see… and then someone jumped out from behind a door… caught Fugaku off guard… pulled a gun…shot him from behind…"

She couldn't go on.

"So is he okay?" Sasuke asked quickly.

"I don't know. When they called, the people from the hospital said they had to wait and see."

Sakura saw Sasuke clench his jaw.

Silently, she prayed to God that Fugaku would be okay.

5 minutes ago, everything had been all right. 5 minutes ago, she had been sitting on the roof with Sasuke, watching the stars and feeling amazing.

5 minutes ago… 5 minutes ago…

She leaned her temple against the cool glass of the window, closing her eyes.

No one was wearing their seat belts.

About 20 minutes later, they sped into the city and arrived at the hospital, everyone jumping out and slamming doors again. They ran into the hospital, into the emergency room. Mikoto sobbing "Uchiha Fugaku, Where is he?" to the receptionist.

The guy looked so much like the man who had come up to Sakura and told her that her parents were dead that she stopped and stared at him for a moment, feeling queasy.

But the guy had said, "Room 15. He just got out of the emergency room—" 

They didn't wait to hear him, sprinting down the hallways and scanning the walls for the room, down a hallway—

Sakura reached over and grabbed Sasuke's hand.

They burst through room 15.

…And found Fugaku sitting in a hospital bed drinking coffee?

The 4 stopped at the door.

They stared at Fugaku.

Fugaku stared at them.

"Dear!" Mikoto cried, running to his side and hugging him around the neck.

He put his coffee on the table beside him, and hugged her back.

"I'm okay, Mikoto," he said softly, patting her hair.

"Dad." Itachi and Sasuke said at the same time, "what happened?"

Fugaku sighed.

"He shot me in the back of the leg. My squad heard, then came in and knocked him out. The Ambulance came, took me to the hospital and…well, Thank God I'm all right."

Mikoto sat back on the Hospital bed.

"So you're okay?" Sasuke asked.

Fugaku nodded.

"Mostly, yes. I have to stay here for some time. My leg still needs some attention."

Mikoto wiped tears from her eyes.

"Oh, Thank God you're okay," she whispered.

Sasuke, Sakura, and Itachi sat in chairs lining the walls.

Mikoto stayed at her husband's side.

A few minutes later, a nurse came in to check on Fugaku.

She had a clip board and started checking things off.

"Well," she said, "everything seems good. You'll just have to stay here for a week or so…" she started talking about his physical condition and how one person was welcome to stay with Fugaku for as long as he was here.

Mikoto volunteered.

The nurse said she'd get someone to pull in a bed for Mikoto. The last thing she said was: "You should be okay, Mr. Uchiha."

Everyone in the room thought: "Thank God."

After a few minutes of just sitting and talking, Sakura started to get tired. It was late. She unconsciously let go of Sasuke's hand and pulled her knees up to her chest, letting her eyes flutter close.

She was asleep.

A little bit later…

She reached up and brushed the eyelash off her cheek.

And Sasuke smirked.

_Finally. _

**A/N: HEY EVERYONE! Please review :D**


	9. Chapter 9

**A/N: Hey! I kind of feel like the end of the last chapter was rushed. Sorry 'bout that. Thank you so much to my readers and reviewers! Oh yeah, and in this chapter, you're going to learn that Sasuke talks a lot when people diss his writing skills. **

**Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto. **

Sasuke blinked at Sakura's sleeping figure. She looked calm and tired and actually…really…pretty.

As usual.

Sasuke froze.

_What…the…he—_

Angry with himself, he tore his eyes away and up, only to find himself looking straight at…Itachi.

And you can all imagine the look on his face, huh?

All the panic and sharp concern from a little while ago had disappeared, now that they knew Fugaku was all right.

Itachi grinned his evil little trademark grin.

"What's on your mind, brother?" he hissed.

Sasuke shot his brother the most annoyed, angry, and inhumane death glare he could muster.

And Uchiha Sasuke's death glares could easily rival anyone's.

This look could've sent even the harshest people heading for the hills.

As a result, Itachi narrowed his eyes and laughed outright.

"You can tell me all your secrets, Sasuke," he whispered, reaching over Sakura to pat Sasuke's arm, "trust me. I won't tell a soul."

Sasuke pushed his hand off and scowled, turning away. He pushed his hands into his pockets and glowered at the floor.

_Why are we still here? _ He asked himself.

But his stupid little conscious wouldn't give him an answer now, oh no.

Stupid little conscious.

"Leave your brother alone, Itachi," Fugaku said darkly, sipping his coffee.

Mikoto nodded at Itachi, saying: "Yeah, kiddo. Sasuke's feelings are his own personal business. You shouldn't bother him about them."

For the very, very first time in his life, Sasuke felt a slight hint of…of…_heat_ rising in his face.

In his mind, he swore.

Again.

Again.

And Again.

Predictable Sasuke.

"Sorry, Mom," Itachi said insincerely.

Then he faced Sasuke's back again and dropped his voice so low that Sasuke had trouble hearing him.

But of course he did.

"So how'd your _date _with Sakura go?"

Sasuke gritted his teeth, and, fuming, snapped: "It wasn't a _date!_"

He couldn't see his brothers face, but by the way the next words left his lips, Sasuke knew Itachi was smirking.

"Yeah? Then what was it?"

Sasuke whipped around then, shouting: "It was a stargazing session! And stop looking so smug. That's my thing."

Sakura jerked awake now because of Sasuke's yelling, rubbing her eyes.

"Huh?"

They ignored her.

"So…" Itachi said, sitting back, "you're telling me all you two did was…gaze at stars?"

Sasuke and Sakura exchanged looks.

_Nope. _

"Yes!" Sasuke all but snarled.

"Oh, yeah?"

"Yeah! Leave me the heck alone!"

Itachi giggled viciously, satisfied that his work was done.

Sakura looked from Uchiha to Uchiha.

Sasuke rubbed his temples, seriously ticked off.

Fugaku rubbed his temples, too.

I mean, listening to his kids arguing about nothing for at least 16 years was kind of taking its toll.

Especially right now, when he was in pain with bandages around his leg.

He looked at Mikoto.

Mikoto sighed and looked at the two teens and one young adult (that was acting like a 2 year old.)

Another sigh.

"Kids…" she started, "maybe you should go home."

All three of the kids stood up.

"What?" Sasuke.

"Why?" Itachi.

"I'm going to stay with Fugaku and…" she thought fast, "Sakura's tired and has to get back home. Sasuke will have to go with her, and Itachi's the only one who can drive…um…properly."

Sasuke looked slightly hurt.

"I can drive, mom."

"Yeah, mom," Itachi said, "I want to stay here. Sasuke can drive."

"…Not without crashing into a mailbox. " Mikoto said. "Or a fence."

Sasuke opened his mouth, then closed it. Then opened it again.

"I can _too_ drive without crashing into a mailbox or a fence! Remember that one time I drove for an hour without crashing into anything?"

"Except a cat." Itachi pointed out.

"I never heard of this," Mikoto said, panicking.

Sasuke turned on his brother.

"It was a squirrel! And I wouldn't have done that if it weren't for you!" he snapped, "you distracted me. You were like, 'look how tall the corns growing this year!'"

"It was soybeans." Itachi said defensively, "and it doesn't matter. You chose to look."

"I chose to look at you to tell you to shut up and let me drive," Sasuke snarled, "that's when I took my eyes off the road and I didn't see the squirrel in the way! It was all. Your. Fault."

"…Yeah…" Itachi considered, "but…you still ran into him."

"Whose side are you _on!_"

"Enough," Fugaku snapped, "your voices are giving me a headache. Itachi- you're driving. Both of you take Sakura home."

"Yes," Mikoto said, "And…I think it'd be nice for your father to get some peace and quiet for the rest of the week. Maybe you guys should show Sakura Konoha. Yeah…" She grabbed a napkin and pen from the table by her husband, "Everyday for the next week, take Sakura to the city. The mall, the zoo, anywhere. Tomorrow, she has to buy things. I'll make a list of everything you have to get, Sakura."

She thought for a moment, then scribbled away at the napkin. After she was done, Mikoto handed it to the Rosette.

Sasuke and Itachi read over Sakura's shoulder.

The napkin read:

-2 different electronics

-Clothes

-Shoes

-Jewelry

-A bag or 3

-Socks

-A washable tattoo!

-Books

-If you get a cell phone, get a case

Sasuke, Sakura and Itachi all looked up and whined: "Aw, mom/ Mrs. Uchiha!" In various tones and levels of whininess.

Sakura shook her head. "I already have most of these things."

"It doesn't matter," Mikoto said, "Just go tour Konoha this week, okay?"

Silence.

"_Okay_?"

"Okay."

"Yes…"

"Uh-huh."

"And Itachi," she added, "you're driving them everywhere. Allright?"

Itachi made a slight face, then grinned, locking eyes with Sasuke.

"It would be my pleasure."

"Good. Here are the car keys! Bye Kids, Love you! Off you go!"

So 2 minutes later found all 3 of them sitting in the huge car.

Itachi sat in the front, Sasuke and Sakura were in the back.

And Sakura made a bold move to sit in the middle seat next to Sasuke. She really didn't even know why she did it… she kind of felt like something wrong in the air.

He blinked at her and then his usual cool smirk fell onto his lips.

He wondered why he wasn't sitting on the left side, by the window, but was quite content with the new change.

Itachi started the car and they set off through the city.

20 minutes later, when they were in the fields, he grinned at them in the rear view mirror.

"So you guys…What's up?"

The emerald star bumped against Sakura's chest, and she gripped it as her face went red.

She didn't even know why.

Sasuke opened his mouth to say something, when suddenly there was a noise like a strangled elephants cry…and the car jerked to an untimely and screeching halt.

Itachi pressed down on the gas.

The car didn't budge.

He cursed.

There wasn't any gas left, actually.

The headlights slowly dimmed, then went off.

"What happened?" Sakura asked, panicking.

"Come on.." Itachi whispered, trying to rev up the car again, but—

Turning the key again, again, and again, but…no use.

He banged his head on the steering wheel.

Repeatedly.

_HONK! HONK! HONK!_

Sasuke and Sakura exchanged looks.

3 kids.

Alone.

Car won't work.

In the middle of practically nowhere.

At night.

…What could _seriously_ go wrong?

**A/N: Hi! PLEASE REVIEW! **


	10. Chapter 10

**A/N: H-e-e-e-e-e-ys! ****PLEASE READ THIS****! Thanks to all my reviewers and readers! You're support is greatly appreciated. Also, I put this on my profile, but I'll put it here too. In chapter 9, in the first Authors note, it says, "Sasuke talks a lot when people diss his writing skills." It's supposed to be "Driving skills." Sorry. **

**Sorry I updated so late, too. I was kind of banned from the internet for most of yesterday. My teenage girl hissy-fits are a little too much for my parents some times. XD. It was punishment. **

**Disclaimer: Gosh, let me look back at the last disclaimer I wrote for the last chapter of this story…hm….what's that? Oh, right. I DON'T OWN NARUTO. **

A lot, as it turns out.

Itachi's honking sounded away, into the night.

He shouted, loud.

A couple of random curse words mashed together, it seemed.

Sakura looked at the raven-haired boy beside her. "What do we do now?"

Sasuke sighed. "Mm…I dunno. Sleep."

"…Thanks a lot, Sasuke."

After a few moments of silence, Itachi twisted around in his seat to look at them.

"Okay, Kiddies, no one panic."

He was panicking.

"If we stay calm and don't panic," Itachi went on quickly, "we can accomplish anything! All right? Who's with me?"

Sasuke clapped slowly with fake enthusiasm.

"Nice one sentence pep talk. That's the first time we've heard that advice before," he rolled his eyes at Sakura.

Itachi put a hand on his chin in a serious, concentrating manner. "I should've been a philosopher."

"Oh, indeed," Sasuke went on sarcastically, "everyone would come from far and wide to listen to a piano playing nimrod like you. Plus, _most_ philosophers are old and wise. Seeing as how you are neither, good luck with—"

"Hey!" Itachi cut in, pouting, "I bet they would listen to me."

Silence. Then:

"If by 'they' you mean 'morons,' I concur."

"Whatever, little brother. There are plenty of young, smart philosophers. You'll never be as good a philosopher as me."

"Like I would want to be."

"Oh, yeah?"

"Yeah."

"_Yeah?_"

"Shut up. I'm not getting involved in this."

There was a pause from Itachi. And then—

"Yeah?"

Sasuke gritted his teeth.

Sakura spoke up. "You guys do realize you're constantly arguing about absolutely nothing in the most dire situations, right?"

Itachi laughed. "Dire? This isn't dire. This is just adventure—"

Outside somewhere faraway, a wolf howled.

…And everyone froze.

They looked outside and saw nothing but darkness. Nothing but fields, sky, and stars.

"Scratch that," Itachi said quickly, "here are our options. We can walk back to the city, get gas, come back, and drive home."

"There's a lot of walking in that option," Sakura murmured frantically, "in the dark. Outside. Alone."

"Or," Itachi went on, "we can just walk home now and deal with the car in the morning. Which one?"

"Why don't we just call your mom and dad?" The rosette asked.

"What are they going to do?" Sasuke asked, flicking his eyes at her. "Besides, we don't want to worry them."

Sakura stared at her hands. "I…guess so."

"Yeah," Itachi said, "so let's put it to a vote. All in favor of going home now, say 'aye.'"

Itachi said, "Aye."

Sakura raised her hand halfway. Aye.

"I…don't really care." Sasuke.

Of course.

"Then it's decided. We go now."

Itachi put his hand on the door and was about to open it when—

Outside, the wolf howled again.

"On second thought…" The older Uchiha started.

"Oh, don't be such a girl," Sasuke said, swinging his door open and stepping out. Sakura followed him, trying not to hesitate. I mean, she didn't want to seem like too much of a _girl_, now did she? Her sneakers hit the concrete, and she got out of the car.

They were all outside.

Doors closed, locks locked….

And Sasuke shoved his hands into the pockets of his red and black plaid shorts.

Mr. Cool, calm, and "I-go-with-the-flow."

No matter how unnerving the situation may be.

Predictable.

Sasuke pulled his cell phone out of and flipped it open.

It was a little past midnight.

"Let's go."

And they went.

They walked along the country road, surrounded by miles of field and meadow. The sky was scattered with those silver stars—everywhere.

Itachi walked on the left, Sakura in the middle, and Sasuke on the right.

Itachi looked frantically behind him and in front of him.

Sakura hugged herself and stared up at the sky.

Sasuke kept his gaze straight ahead, occasionally flicking his eyes at the starry night above.

The wolf howled.

Sakura and Itachi yelped and the Pink haired jumped into his arms.

A breeze blew.

"The wolf's closer!" They hissed together.

"No, really?" Sasuke muttered, casting Itachi an irritated look.

When Itachi registered that Sakura was in his arms, he looked over at Sasuke. His facial expression was probably priceless.

Itachi saw him glaring and broke out into his cocky grin.

They proceeded walking again, Sakura letting go of Itachi.

After a little while, they heard music.

It was faint, slow, and…was that a violin?

Squinting ahead, they saw someone sitting under a streetlight…playing the instrument. They couldn't make out the features, but it was the same tune from…

Sasuke's dark eyes met Sakura's.

The same guy from before.

Itachi said nothing, as he didn't get what was going on.

Farther they walked, and they neared the man.

His back was leaning against the light pole, one of his knees was arched, the other out in front of him, and the violin was in his hands. It was actually quite a nice tune he was playing. They couldn't see his face because there was a hood over it. By his side were two things, a broken cup for collecting money, and a small book that said…

You know what I'm talking about, right?

The three exchanged looks.

Then Sasuke pulled a couple dollars out of his pocket, dropping them into the cup.

"Thank you very…" The guy looked up, then stopped playing abruptly, his eyes fixed on Sakura. He let the violin fall, jumping up.

"Oh my! Oh my Goodness!"

He darted in front of the Rosette—but Sasuke was already there.

"Don't touch her."

"No, please, that's not it," he said frantically, "she…she has pink hair."

"Yes," Itachi spoke, "we noticed."

"No, no," the man went on, looking at the Pink Haired over Sasuke's shoulder, "That means you're…a Haruno? Haruno Sakura, correct?"

Sakura's heart was thumping loud in her chest.

"Uh…yeah?"

"And you two must be the Uchiha brothers, correct?" He looked at Itachi and Sasuke. The older one nodded, but Sasuke narrowed his eyes at the man.

The guy pulled down his hood, revealing his face.

Which had a mask over it.

There was an eye patch over his left eye.

Spiky grey hair rose up.

"My name is Hatake Kakashi. And Sakura, my dear..."

Wind blew.

"You are in grave, grave danger."

"What?" All three of them said.

"Sit down," he whispered; going back to where he was seated before, "I need to explain."

The brothers and Sakura stared at each other.

"Just a second," Sakura said, "we have to uh…discuss—something."

The three kids walked a couple feet away and leaned in.

"Okay. What do we do?"

"We can't trust this creep."

"But he knows her name, Sasuke. It's proof."

"So what? Anyone could know that. There's such a thing called a directory, idiot."

"And how did he know her hair's pink? Huh, Mr. Uchiha Sasuke?"

"I. Don't. Know."

"Come on, you hooligans! This is a matter of life and death!" Kakashi called from behind, "And I haven't got all night, either!"

"What's a hooligan?" Itachi asked.

Sasuke face palmed.

"I think…" Sakura whispered, "We should just see what he has to say. If it's crap, we leave. Cool?"

"Fine."

"All right."

They made their way back, and sat in a straight line, all of them facing Kakashi.

"Okay, Ms. Haruno," he started—

"It's just Sakura. Please."

"Fine then, Sakura. You're in grave, grave danger."

"We got that part, I think."

Kakashi rubbed his temples.

_Insolent Children…_

"Do you remember…the night your parents were killed?"

Sakura had already cried over it today, and she would absolutely _not_ let herself get emotional in front of a guy she didn't know, plus Itachi and Sasuke.

No way.

"How could I forget?"

"Just…let…me…That was a_ rhetorical question._"

"Oh."

"Yes. But you see, the truck driver who did it, He—"

And suddenly the wolf howled again.

Much, much closer.

And everyone froze.

There was rustling in some bushes nearby, then all four of them stood.

They readied themselves.

Itachi and Sakura clung to each other behind Kakashi and the other Uchiha.

And an idea struck one of them.

"Let's catch it, kill it, and cook it for breakfast," Sasuke hissed sarcastically.

Kakashi threw him an amused face and took a battle stance at his side.

"Sasuke!" Itachi and Sakura yelped.

Sasuke found it in him to smirk.

"Just kidding."

Sakura gripped the emerald star at her throat.

More rustling, another howl.

Hearts thumped faster, eyes narrowed.

And out of the bushes…jumped…

**A/N: Hi everyone! Review! Seriously, please? Let me know how I'm doing! Thanks! Oh yeah, and I didn't know what a hooligan was until I looked it up. And I don't even think it applies to how I used it up there, but oh well. :) **


	11. Chapter 11

**A/N: HI! Thanks to everyone who reviewed and thanks if you're reading this!**

**Disclaimer: Sigh. I don't own Naruto.**

A little…white…dog?

The so-called-"wolf."

He cast the four an uncaring look, and zipped across the road to the fields on the other side. He sped away, into the distance, howling.

"Well," Sasuke said, "there goes my breakfast."

Everyone sighed and slumped slightly, in relief.

Sakura laughed nervously.

_Moron._

And suddenly there was shouting.

They all froze.

There was something else, bigger running towards them.

"Here we go again…"

And the next thing to burst through the bushes was…

A boy.

He had red triangles on his face

"AKAMARU!" He shouted, "come back! You have to take your bath! It wasn't my idea, so—!"

And he stopped right when he saw Sasuke, Itachi, Sakura, and Kakashi, staring at him.

"Oh. Hi," He said quickly. "Right. Did you see a little dog? White fur?"

"That way," they said in unison, pointing to the right.

"Thanks!" he said through clenched teeth, and ran off in the direction of his dog.

After a few minutes:

"Okay…" Kakashi said, turning back around, "that was weird. Now back to what I was saying. Sit down, all of you."

They sat.

"So where was I?"

"The truck driver who killed my parents," Sakura said harshly.

He nodded.

"The driver who did it…he did it on purpose."

Sakura's mouth went dry.

"What?" she forced out of her lips.

Kakashi kept his eyes trained on her face.

"The car crash was set up."

Sakura shook her head.

_No way, God, no, no, no…_

"No." She said, her voice trembling, "That's not possible. Why would they do that? And how do you know?"

Kakashi looked around to make sure no one was around, then dropped his voice down:

"The people who hired that truck driver, to crash into your car that day… they wanted all of you gone. And now they're coming for you, too. I know all this because—I don't think you noticed me that night, but—I was on the side of the street, playing this violin. I overheard the truck driver talking on his phone with whoever it was who hired him. He said he 'didn't succeed in killing the kid'. Something must've gone wrong."

Sakura swallowed hard.

"But why'd they kill my mom and dad?"

"I…I don't know, Sakura. I'll explain it to you when I figure everything out."

She clenched her teeth and shut her eyes.

"You're in danger Sakura. They're coming for you. And thank Goodness I've found you now. It would have been too late. Tomorrow, the car crash will have been a month ago. The driver said 30 days later, he'd set out to search for you."

"But…I thought he was in jail," Sakura muttered, fighting not to cry.

"His son broke him out. The police are looking for him everywhere, haven't you turned on the news? He knows you're in Konoha, Sakura. And he's coming."

"How does he know that?" Sasuke asked, finally speaking.

Kakashi turned to look at him.

"The people who hired him, they have workers everywhere. And the woman at the reception desk at Sakura's orphanage, she was one, too."

"What?" The Rosette cried, bewildered, "_Anko_?"

"Yes," Kakashi answered, "Her. She let him know you were going to this city."

"No…" Sakura whispered, "I feel like I can't trust anyone."

At her side, Sasuke stiffened.

Sakura blinked then wished she bit that back.

She looked up at him, shaking her head, "No, I didn't mean—"

Kakashi cut in.

"How old are you?"

The question was directed at Sasuke.

"Sixteen."

"Him you can trust," The grey haired said, "You have to be eighteen for them to hire you. But _you_, on the other hand," he looked at Itachi.

He blinked.

"You look about twenty-five."

"Five years off, old man!"

"I'm not old."

"Oh, yeah?"

"Yeah. Just a little senior to you."

"Really?"

"Yes."

"…Oh, yeah?"

"Yes. Do you enjoy picking fights and causing trouble?...Hooligan."

"He does, actually," Sasuke put in.

Itachi paused.

"No one's telling me what a hooligan is!"

"Actually," Kakashi shook his head, "you can trust him, too. He sounds a bit stupid to be—"

"Hey!"

"–- one of them. The point is, Sakura, you need to be careful this week. If he doesn't find you and gives up, I think he'll go back. He's knows your with the Uchiha family. I don't suggest you should stay home. Plus, you're Mr. and Mrs. Uchiha are at the hospital, right? Yes. The guy who shot Fugaku was probably in contact with the man who killed your parents. They're trying to separate you from everyone." He swore. "Except for tonight, Go somewhere with a lot of people so he can't find you. You might want to change your appearances as well. If he sees pink hair, he'll know it's you. Oh yeah, and he won't kill you on the spot, probably kidnap you first—"

"Kidnap me first, huh? Great."

"And…" He nodded at Itachi and Sasuke, "I hope you two will be watching her."

They nodded.

"Everyone knows who the Uchiha are. So, for you two_ and_ Sakura, either dye your hair, cut it—"

"No way," All three of them said.

"I'll just wear a hood or something," Sasuke scoffed.

"I wanna wear a sombrero!" Itachi cried, deeply thrilled. "And maybe I'll get a fake beard!"

Sasuke resisted the urge to punch him and looked over at Sakura.

"Could I just…get some extensions in my hair? Or wear a wig?" she asked.

"The wig would work. And colored contact lenses will help, too. For all of you."

They nodded.

"Wait," Sakura said after a second, "but how do we know you're not one of them? The people who hired the guy? And what's his name—the man who killed my parents?"

"It's Jiraiya. He has long grey hair. I think that should be enough to spot him."

"Jiraiya," she whispered to herself. _Jiraiya_. She was going to stay calm about this. Be strong. Get it together.

"And how do you know I'm not on their side? Fantastic question." Kakashi said. "Well, I have no proof….Except. For. This!"

He thrust out his book.

Sakura read the title out loud, and the kids made faces.

"Indeed, they don't hire big readers. Or people who come late. To. Everything."

He scratched the back of his head nervously.

"Hahaha! Enough about me!"

"But how do we know that book isn't just like…a prop or something?"

"You _don't_ know," Kakashi said, sliding the book into his pocket. He pushed the broken cup into a sac on his belt, and pulled his hood back over his head. He picked up his instrument.

"After all," he said, standing, "I'm just a guy with a violin."

And he went, playing his music.

"I'll see you around!" He called over his shoulder.

Kakashi became a small figure in the distance, the last notes of his song flying on the wind.

A few minutes later:

"Well."

"That was…"

"Weird."

"Yeah…"

Sakura yawned. "Sasuke," she said sleepily, rubbing her eyes.

He raised his eyebrows. "Yeah?"

"Nothing. I'm just glad I spilled my guts to you. It's easier...to… Live."

_Random, _Sasuke thought, but he smirked and helped her up.

Itachi pouted. "I feel excluded."

"Really?" Sasuke asked sarcastically.

A little bit later, they walked.

Under the stars, with the fields at their sides and the horizon ahead.

When they finally, finally, reached home, Sasuke was half dragging, half leading Sakura to the door.

She was too sleepy to do anything.

Right when Sasuke was about to start muttering stereotypical comments about girls, he sighed and thought about everything she'd been through in just one day.

Itachi closed the door behind them.

Naruto was laying on the ground, bored.

When they came in, he meowed and went to rub himself against Itachi's leg.

Itachi picked him up and petted his head.

"Sakura…" Sasuke whispered gently, trying to wake her up.

She mumbled something about cupcakes and ice cream.

Sasuke sighed.

Itachi flicked on some lights so they could see. Sasuke pulled his phone out of his pocket and read…It was 1:00 a.m. He put the phone back.

He rubbed his eyes with his free hand.

Uchiha Sasuke has his weaknesses, too, you know.

He had one of her arms around his neck and was holding her left side for the entire journey after meeting Kakashi.

And he was beat.

What was he supposed to do with Sakura?

Her shoes were still on, not to mention her dirty socks.

And she was drooling on his shirt.

Poor Sakura.

Sasuke used all the energy inside of him to groan, really, _really_, loud.

Sakura shifted slightly.

Itachi dropped Naruto to the ground and started walked away, across the polished wood.

"You moron!" Sasuke hissed. "You're just going to leave me here? Help out a little!"

Itachi threw his cocky grin over his shoulder.

"Just wake her up, brother."

"No way!"

Itachi walked back towards them.

"Fine, then I will."

"No, Itachi, you idiot! Don't—"

He shook her shoulder a couple times.

"Sakura! Sakura!"

Sakura heard something on the edges of her consciousness. A rather irritating… persistent buzz…

"Sakura! _SAKURA!_"

"uh?"

Her eyes fluttered open.

And she woke up, her face extremely close to that of Sasuke and Itachi was in her face, too, screaming "Sakura!" at the top of his lungs. Along with Naruto meowing probably the same thing in his shrillest voice.

"Augh!"

And she fell out of Sasuke's arms, to land flat on the ground.

THUD!

(Imagine like, how in an anime when someone falls it's really simple and just…THUD!)

Sasuke opened his mouth slightly, locking eyes with Naruto.

If cats could laugh, Sasuke was pretty sure he was doing just that right then.

Now, Sasuke and Naruto weren't exactly on good terms here, Sasuke sill weary of the cat because of his oh-so-subtle destroying of his bed almost a week ago.

Itachi scrambled forward to help Sakura.

"Sorry!" he laughed, grabbing her arm and pulling her up.

"Itachi…"Sasuke said through his teeth, "I will never…ever…get tired of calling you an idiot. Remember that."

"I won't forget," he grinned evilly.

Sakura, dazed, rubbed her eyes.

Her mind throbbed.

"Ow." She murmured.

There was a sleepy yawn.

She wiped her mouth, looked at her hand, then at Sasuke's shirt.

And her face burned.

"Ack! I'm sorry!" She hurried to his side and used her sleeve to wipe it off.

"I'm such an idiot," she whispered. "I _drooled _on your shirt….Ugh."

He stood there calmly, glaring at Itachi and Naruto past Sakura.

Naruto had that kitty-cat grin on his face.

And Itachi was laughing, you see.

He was laughing his sly, foxy, cocky little laugh.

Cat and Uchiha.

They were quite a pair.

Sasuke was quite used to it, as you can imagine.

Sakura stepped back when she was done.

After a moment of awkward silence, she started taking off her shoes and socks. Itachi went over to make sure the door was locked. Sasuke slipped off his sneakers and socks, and they stood there.

The three of them.

"All right, Kiddies, go to sleep. Remember, Sasuke, we have to protect Sakura extremely well this week!"

"I haven't forgotten."

"Right then! Get to sleep!"

And Sasuke and Sakura went up the stairs.

Itachi went to the kitchen to finish his dinner.

Predictable.

"You know what?" Sakura asked Sasuke sleepily. "We never got the telescope or the plates or anything from the roof."

Sasuke nodded slowly. "I'll get them tomorrow."

Sakura turned to him, "No, I didn't mean for you to do it. Sorry, I was just saying—"

They reached the top, and Sasuke turned to face her.

He put his hand on the inside of her elbow, sending heat up her arm.

"Don't be sorry, okay? It's fine."

She looked unbelieving, so he shot her a half-smile.

"Right. Thanks, Sasuke." She said, flashing a grin.

He took a few steps back, shoving his hands into his pockets.

"I promised I'd be here for you forever, didn't I?"

"You did."

"Yeah. Night, Sakura."

"Well…" She said, "more like Good morning."

He laughed.

"Sakura, Good way too early morning."

She grinned. "Morning, Sasuke."

And Sakura stepped into her room, flicking on the lights and closing the door.

Sasuke looked at her door, a sigh escaping his lips.

She was being really brave about this whole, 'There's a guy out to kill you' thing.

He went to his room and shut the door.

Sakura went to the bathroom and changed into her favorite pair of pajamas from the closet.

They were dark purple shorts and t-shirt with watermelons all over.

The watermelons had smiley faces on them.

Right when she was getting into bed, there was scratching at the door.

Sakura ran up to the door and opened it, letting her cat it.

"Nya!" Naruto meowed, prancing across her room and hopping into the bed.

Sakura laughed and shut the door, turning off the lights.

She got into bed, pulling the blanket over her and the orange kitty.

"So I guess you sleep here, huh?" Sakura asked.

"Meow."

"Nice answer, Naruto. But what should I expect? You're a cat. I'm a human."

"Meow?"

Sakura tried not to think about tomorrow, so she distracted herself.

"But you know what? Some people communicate with their pets without even talking. It's like they know what each other are saying just by looking in each other eyes. We should try that, Naruto."

Sleepy "Meow."

"Sorry. Maybe tomorrow—"

And Sasuke's words came back to her.

_Don't be sorry, okay?_

"…Okay." She whispered into the darkness.

She looked at her dresser, on the top, the octagonal prism flashing with starlight, amazingly; the cherry blossoms and diamonds twinkling together at the bottom.

_Tomorrow…_

Sakura gripped the emerald star at her throat and closed her eyes, not bothering to take it off.

To think that this morning, she was sitting in the orphanage office, twiddling her thumbs.

And now…well…

Enough adventure for a day.

~End of Day 1~

**A/N: YAY! Please review!**


	12. Chapter 12

**A/N: HEY! Thank you soo much to everyone who reviewed! Thank you to my readers! And everyone who favorites my story and me! And people who add this piece of writing to their alerts! Thank you so much! You guys ROCK!**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto.**

As it happens, Day 1 ended but the night was still on.

Sakura jerked awake a couple hours later, in the dark, staring wildly around at this unfamiliar place. Her sheets were drenched in sweat and she felt alone and scared and lost.

For a second or two.

Until an orange ball of fur opened his ice blue eyes.

Naruto woke up, stretched, and hopped into her lap.

"_Hello_," she whispered, hugging him to her chest.

Quite grateful, actually.

The moon had apparently come out because soft white light splashed across her floor.

And where there's light, there's shadows.

Dark shapes leaped behind the dresser and computer, by the closet, desk—

_It's just your imagination, Sakura!_

Yeah….but….

Outside, wind howled.

"Naruto?" she whispered quickly, "I'm thirsty. Let's get out of here."

"Nya?"

She clung to him and tip-toed over to the door, (which was already slightly open, Sakura didn't get why) turning the knob slowly, and creaking it open as quietly as she could, keeping her eyes fixed on it, stepped into the bonus room, then shut it without a sound.

"Well. you're up early."

She jumped, yelped, and spun around when she heard Sasuke's voice behind her.

He was lying on the couch, with his cell phone in his hand, blue light scattered across his face.

"Um. So are you." Sakura said.

Naruto jumped from her arms and flounced over to Sasuke.

It was dark here, too, save for some moonlight flashing through the transparent curtains.

"Yeah," the Uchiha said, snapping his phone shut, "I couldn't sleep. That cat ripped up my bed again."

"…Oh. Um. Again?"

There was a nod—and he left it at that.

It appeared to be something Sasuke didn't exactly want to discuss.

Naruto hopped up into Sasuke's lap, rubbing his nose against his arm, purring in his cute little way.

Seemingly innocent.

Oh, how deceiving this kitty cat could be.

"Sakura…" Sasuke said through clenched teeth, glaring at Naruto, "Get...him…off…me."

Sakura scrambled forward and scooped her cat out of Sasuke's lap.

Sasuke stood and dropped his phone into his pockets.

He stepped into a patch of moonlight.

He had a black T-shirt on and some comfy looking shorts that resembled boxers, but Sakura didn't dare ask.

"I'm going to get water," She said, tearing her eyes away from his figure.

"I'll go with."

And they walked down the stairs, in the darkness.

Naruto did nothing, just let himself get carried across the polished wood floor, occasionally flicking out his claws and looking all smug at Sasuke.

Said Uchiha cast stony death glares at the cat but said nothing.

Sasuke decided to distract himself.

"Nice P.J.'s," he scoffed.

"Thanks!" Sakura said, turning around to grin. Then she looked at what he was wearing.

"Nice…uh…"

_Shorts? Pants? T-Shirt? _

"Uh…"

The right side of Sasuke's lip shot slightly upward.

"N-never mind."

She turned away flushing.

Sasuke allowed himself a silent chuckle, flicked on the lights, and led her across the floor only to find—

Itachi?

Sitting?

On a couch?

Asleep?

In front of the T.V?

Which was off?

Huh?

Sasuke blinked at Itachi then turned and exchanged a look with Sakura.

Naruto went: "Nya."

Sasuke made his way to his older brother.

He poked Itachi in the shoulder a couple times.

"Hey!" he hissed. "Wake up! What are you still doing here?"

After a while, Itachi muttered: "Blah…GAH!... Blah….pretty…Jasmine flowers… Hmmmmm... Pink..ng…Rhinos...STOP! Come back! I won't…eat….Uhhhhhh…."

Sasuke opened his mouth, just slightly.

"…What the crap?"

Sakura came to stand by him.

"So what? He's just sleep talking. I do that all the time."

"I know."

"Huh?"

He sighed irritably.

"Nothing. This moron went to finish his dinner and decided not to come back up. Well, Fine. We'll just leave him here."

They got Sakura's water and went back up the stairs, Naruto shrinking away from the cup full of H20.

The rosette yawned. And then she noticed a vase of roses in the corner. _Roses…_

Sasuke jumped onto the couch again as they reached the top of the stairs. He folded his arms behind his head, staring at the ceiling.

Sakura stood there awkwardly, clutching Naruto and the cup.

"Go to sleep," Sasuke said.

"Er-right. You too."

He looked side long at her and nodded. Once.

But Sakura didn't budge.

"What? What's on your mind?" The raven haired asked.

"Um. Can I tell you?"

Sasuke saw the worry in her eyes and swung his legs off the couch, making room.

After some silent weighing of decisions Sakura made her way over and sat slowly next to him.

Naruto felt something sad in the air and ducked his head down, into Sakura's lap.

"So..um…I was thinking about something," Sakura said, "…ok, have your parents ever tried to force you into something that they believed was good for you in the long run?"

There was a nod.

"Well, and…you didn't want to do it, right? And you knew you really sucked at it?"

"Yeah."

"And you had to start, like, a month after all the other kids in the club? So you were always last in everything and you were always the worst and everyone—"

"Laughed? Yeah."

"Laughing. Always laughing. Yeah…so…I was really upset about this club my mom was making me join… and… I kind of did something stupid."

Sasuke waited.

Sakura downed the water and swallowed hard.

"I took this one rose from our garden and pulled all the petals off. Like, one by one. I was taking all my feelings off on that flower. I don't even know why I did it. I was just thinking about how unfair life was, started crying and fell asleep right there. My mom came in a little later and found me like that. Sprawled on the floor with the petals around me, the stem in my hand. She didn't make me go to the club afterwards, even though I was doing all right at it, I guess…but…yeah. And a thorn pricked me, too. Pretty deep."

She held up her thumb.

There was nothing there, but her eyes still saw where it had pierced her skin.

Sasuke nodded, saying nothing.

It seemed to be something he was good at.

Sakura sighed and put her hand back down, running her fingers through Naruto's fur.

"I'm spilling my guts to you again. Sorry I just said all that-"

"Don't be sorry."

_Don't be sorry._

"Yeah. And…I dunno…Those roses over there," she gestured to the vase in the corner, "they look exactly like the one I took apart."

There was a long silence.

"I take out my anger in ways I can't explain, too," he sighed, turning his onyx eyes to her. His black hair was outlined with moonlight. "I'm not saying its right or okay. People do it anyway. But it reminds me of this…quotation I read somewhere."

"What is it?"

"'The True test of a person with character is he doesn't lose his humanity even when he is furious.'"

"That…makes sense," Sakura said, "yeah. It does. Who said it?"

Sasuke shook his head. "I don't know. Someone important."

"Oh. Thanks."

He smirked his "you're welcome."

Uchiha Sasuke—

Mr. Blunt and to the point.

Naruto meowed.

Sakura yawned again.

"You should sleep," Sasuke said to her, "big day tomorrow."

Tomorrow.

"Yeah."

Sakura stood and walked to her door.

He sensed slight fear in her step.

"Hey, I promised I'd be here for you, didn't I?"

"Yeah," She said; her back to him.

"But we already had this conversation," Sasuke said, "so sleep."

"Repetitive much," Sakura grinned.

"Yeah, yeah. Night."

"Morning."

Sakura went into her room and shut the door, tired again.

She jumped into bed with Naruto, setting her cup on the desk.

The Pink-haired didn't even look at the shadows, and she finally got to sleep.

~A couple hours later~

There was a BANG BANG BANG on Sakura's door.

She jerked awake again, this time morning sunshine flooding thru the window, bathing the room in vibrant gold.

The rosette's cat woke with a start, too, slightly irritated that someone would so harshly interrupt his sleep with that infernal racket.

Deal with it, Naruto.

"Sakura!" Sasuke yelled from outside, banging on the door again, "come on! Wake up! Get downstairs, hurry!"

"Wha'?" Sakura moaned, rubbing the sleep from her eyes.

"Come on," he said frantically from outside, pulling a blue T-shirt over his head, "someone left a message yesterday while we were gone. A social worker's coming, to check up on you— To see how you're doing-she expects us to be waiting for her by the door! And she's strolling up the front walk, Right _now!_ Get downstairs."

Sakura leapt out of bed.

_Oh, great,_ she thought.

On top of everything that just happened, she had to worry about this, too.

Outside her room, Sasuke ran down the steps, using his speed and agility to not fall and land on his face.

He sprinted into the kitchen, swinging around a wall and grabbed half a bagel from the fridge. They had to go to the city today. Oh, right. Sigh. Sasuke was still wet from the shower he had just taken, and his hair was still dripping, plus his clothes were sticking to him, he was tired, hungry, cold, and that Cat had ripped up his bed.

Mondays just don't start better than that.

From behind him someone yawned really loud.

Itachi.

And the door bell rang.

Sasuke gritted his teeth and turned around.

He hurried over to him.

"What the heck are you still doing here? Go get dressed! Someone's coming from Sakura's old Orphanage, hurry it up, you idiot!"

Itachi stretched calmly.

"Sasuke," he muttered sleepily, "I had the weirdest dream last night."

"I don't really care, Itachi."

"No, no listen. I dreamed about this kid named Naruto. He had this really cool spiky orange hair. And he was holding a flower while riding this pink rhino, running away from me…and…I think I was supposed to eat him for dinner or something. But I didn't want to. I dunno. Anyway...Did you have a dream last night?"

Sasuke twitched.

"No, Itachi. Get up stairs and get dressed before I kill you."

"Well, I changed after we came home yesterday. So I'm in P.J's. I think that's okay. Right?"

It rang again.

"It's not okay! Just forget it! Come on!"

It went without saying that, when his parents weren't home, Sasuke was in charge.

Because Itachi was…well…Itachi…

"DING DING DING!" The door bell again, more urgent.

Sasuke ate the bagel as fast as he could, running to the door with his brother.

He almost ran into Sakura (who was sprinting down the steps), and the three of them stood in front of the door.

Sakura stepped forward and opened it.

And it swung open.

A woman stood there, the social worker.

She had long blonde hair in two ponytails.

There was a diamond in the center of her forehead.

And she looked mad.

Mad to have to wait outside for oh-so-very long while she had informed these people that she was coming.

Quite angry to see 3 young persons, one in his P.J.'s with drool on his mouth, another was dripping wet, so much so that there was a puddle of water on the floor, sliding down his black shorts, (she assumed that those two were the Uchiha brothers) and the last one, Haruno Sakura, she believed, wringing her hands and biting her lip, with extremely untidy pink hair—

With a cat on it.

There was an orange cat on her head.

Sakura sent a weak smile in the woman's direction.

Itachi scratched the back of his head quite nervously.

And Sasuke…

Sasuke shoved his hands into his pockets.

**A/N: Hi! I feel like I didn't do very well on this chapter. But review, please. **


	13. Chapter 13

**A/N: I HATE WRITER'S BLOCK! **

**I really, really, do. When you check the clock, it says, 12:35, and you're sitting in front of the computer with the curser just…blinking at you after the few sentences you wrote. When you get distracted between listening to music, drawing random manga of random T.V. shows, When you know you're running out of time to write. And when you look back at the clock it's 1: 37. And you still haven't written anything. **

**It. Sucks. **

**So anyway. I thought I'd just tell you, I'm wearing black leggings with shorts on top with white socks with sparkly pink and green watermelons on them. Because I had to run around the block. **

**Ahem. **

**That was random. But then again, so am I. **

**Hello guys and girls! Hope you're having a good day.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto. If I did, there'd be more romance for Shikamaru and Temari. I really love that pairing. **

**Anyway, here we go!**

"My name is Tsunade," the social worker said sharply, fuming, pulling out her ID from her pocket and showing it to them, "and I'm here to see Sakura."

"She's right there!" Itachi trilled, pointing at Sakura over Sasuke.

"Yes," Tsunade snapped, glaring at Itachi, "she's right there. But where, indeed, are your parents?"

"Come on in!" Sakura said quickly, changing the subject, and beckoning the woman in.

Tsunade pulled a clipboard from behind her back and stepped into the house, taking off her heels.

The rosette took a quick look around for the man with the long grey hair.

He wasn't there.

Yet.

But she knew he was coming, sooner or later, and when he did, they couldn't be here.

"Sit down!" Itachi said, tugging Tsunade towards one of the family rooms.

"Sakura," Sasuke hissed as she shut the door, "why is that _thing_ on your head?"

"He's not a thing, Sasuke," she whispered back, locking the door, "he's Naruto! And I think he's afraid of the doorbell. As soon as it rang, he jumped onto my head and won't come down!"

Naruto's facial expression was similar to the kind of face you'd make if someone had come up to you and screamed at the top of their lungs while banging drums and blowing electronic trumpets.

And didn't stop.

"Ah, God."

Sakura was wearing the first thing she saw in Mikoto's bags and threw it on. It was a light brown knee-length skirt with green leaves, and her top was a long sleeve white shirt with black clouds with silver stars scattered underneath. From the side and stretching across her chest was a rainbow with music notes on it.

It was really cool.

They went back over to the family room where Itachi was trying to tell Tsunade about his dream.

She was thoroughly ignoring him, interrogating the Uchiha about why he was still in his P.J's and if he still hadn't noticed that there was drool on his lip, now hanging in a string of spit from his chin.

"Oh, right!" he said, and wiped his mouth.

Finally.

Sasuke and Sakura seated themselves on an extremely comfy light blue sofa across from Tsunade and Itachi. Sakura's leg was brushing Sasuke's.

Tsunade turned to Sasuke.

"Where are your parents?"

"At the hospital."

She blinked. "Why?"

"My dad got shot."

Her jaw dropped.

"What? How? Is he…is he…"

"He's not dead, thankfully," Sakura said, "he just has to recover. So he's staying there for a week."

"And Mrs. Uchiha?"

"She's there, too."

"…I see."

She scribbled something down on her clipboard. And then she looked at Sakura.

"How've you been?"

"Um."

Between meeting Sasuke, unpacking, crying, sleeping, messing up at lunch, sitting on a balcony with the raven haired boy, spilling her guts, going to the third and fourth floor and the roof with Sasuke, being amazed and scared, spilling water all over Sasuke, eating dinner with Sasuke on the roof and under the stars, have Itachi interrupt, find out Fugaku got shot, go to the hospital, find out everything was okay, start driving home, car stops, start walking, meet Kakashi, figure out someone's coming to kill her—

"Sakura?"

"Um, I've been doing…peachy."

Naruto shifted on her head, just slightly, but didn't budge.

Tsunade wrote something down, then looked back up at Sakura.

"Could I…speak with you for a moment, Ms. Haruno? Alone?"

When Kakashi had called her "Ms. Haruno" she snapped at him her name. When this woman spoke, she heard something between concern and anger.

So Sakura didn't dare speak up.

"Uh, Sure."

Sakura stood up and led Tsunade into the kitchen.

Then she turned around and exchanged a look with Sasuke.

_We can still hear you, _his eyes said.

"Right," Sakura said, looking around. She tried to remember what Sasuke had shown her yesterday. "Er, we can go out on the deck." Tsunade nodded, and Sakura led to the morning room, then through the sliding glass doors to the deck outside.

They sat in some chairs.

Sakura was nervous about being outside when Jiraiya was coming, but…he probably wasn't even in the city yet. Konoha was actually quite far from her old house.

Regardless, there was no way she would tell Tsunade about him.

"Sakura," the social worker said, "I need you to tell me the truth."

"Sure."

"You're okay here, right?"

"Yeah, definitely."

"And no one…abuses you, right?"

"W...What? Abuse?"

Tsunade nodded.

"You don't seem very well. If anyone does…please let me know. Either Fugaku Uchiha, or Mikoto, or—"

"No," Sakura shook her head, "no one does. No one beats me, Lady Tsunade."

"Or the two boys in there? Uchiha Itachi? Or that…Sasuke?"

Sakura felt herself almost grin, shaking her head.

Sasuke?

She could _never_ see Sasuke raise his hand to her.

It was just…not comprehendible.

The way he had put his hand on her back when they were coming down from the roof, when he had stepped in front of her when Kakashi was running toward her, the way he gripped her hand even if he didn't want to, how he had promised her a lot, so much she'd never heard anyone say to her—

She'd never have believed it…She'd never have admitted it to herself, but...but…

Was she falling for Uchiha Sasuke?

"Sakura?"

Naruto meowed suddenly.

"I'm fine, Lady Tsunade," The rosette said, "Really, I am."

_Except there's a guy out to kill me. Oh, sorry, kidnap me first. Then kill me. _

"All right, then, Sakura. Let's go back."

They stood and made their way back to Sasuke and Itachi. (Locking the door behind them of course.)

Who were, for the minutes in which Sakura and Tsunade were outside, discussing the different contacts and fake facial hair pieces they were going to get when they went to the city.

Well, let's not say "discussed."

How about, "Itachi blabbering on to his brother about all that stuff."

Sasuke frowned and informed Itachi that he was _not_ going to get any fake facial hair, and ignored his brother upon everything else that came out of his mouth.

So basically, it was pretty much a one-sided conversation.

That's when Sakura and Tsunade came in, so thankfully (in Sasuke's mind) interrupting Itachi.

"Okay," the social worker said, "so. Do you guys want to show me Sakura's room?"

"Uh, yeah. Let's…go."

The Uchiha brothers stood.

Sasuke and Sakura led the way, with Itachi and Tsunade following behind.

Sakura looked at Sasuke, and both of them were thinking the same thing:

_We don't have time for this._

But she felt slightly awkward next to him.

She found herself looking at him with a weird shyness she'd never felt next to him before.

_Maybe this is what happens when you figure out you like someone, _she thought, _and you're afraid to tell them how you feel because…because…what if they don't think of you like that? How can you ever be sure? ACK! I hate this!_

Probably.

Sasuke caught her staring.

He raised his eye brows.

"Yo." He said.

Sakura blinked up at him.

"What?" he asked.

"It's nothing." She said quickly, looking away and blushing.

They got to her room, and Sakura pushed the door open.

Her bed wasn't made, her P.J's were on the floor, and her emerald star necklace was lying on her pillow. On her desk was the list that Mikoto had made her yesterday, along with the cup.

"Hm," Tsunade said, writing on her clip board after looking at the room.

Then she turned around.

"All right. I think that's all. I'll be going now."

And with that, she nodded at the Itachi, shook hands with Sasuke, and put her palm on Sakura's shoulder.

"Take care."

She went down the steps with the three.

Sakura opened the door for her.

Tsunade slipped on her heels and stepped out of the house.

"Next time," she said with her back to them, "I expect you to be waiting for me _on time_ by the door. Thank you."

Sakura shut the door.

"Well." Sasuke said.

"That was…" Sakura.

"Fun." Itachi put in.

"No, Itachi," Sasuke muttered, "that was a waste of time."

And just then…Naruto meowed loudly, yawned, and hopped onto the floor.

He stretched, then pranced over to Itachi and rubbed himself against his leg.

"I wonder why he's afraid of door bells," Sakura said nervously, "and why he's back to normal right now."

"Hn," Sasuke said, "We'll figure it out. But for now…people, get ready. 'Cause we're leaving."

**A/N: HEYS! Please review. I promise by the next chapter we'll be in the city. :D**


	14. Chapter 14

**A/N: Heys :D Thanks to my readers and reviewers! **

**Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto. Duh. **

The three of them were standing outside. Sasuke and Itachi were pacing, while Sakura was leaning against the door. She'd changed into some dark blue Capri's instead of the skirt. She had the list Mikoto gave her and the black and silver wallet in her pocket.

Right now, they didn't have their hats/contacts/hoods on, they'd get all that in the city.

Right now, they were deciding on their means of transportation.

"Okay," Itachi said, "we can walk."

"No," Sasuke said, "that'll take too long. And we shouldn't walk down a deserted street all alone."

"It's not deserted!" Itachi protested.

He certainly enjoyed protesting.

Sasuke waved at him to shut his brother up.

"Let's just take another car," the younger Uchiha said.

"Oh, RIGHT!" Itachi shouted. "Wait. Why didn't I think of that?"

"…Do you really want me to answer you?"

"Don't bother, Sasuke."

Sasuke shrugged with a smirk on his face and pushed his hands into his pockets.

They walked to another end of the house (Sakura following awkwardly behind) and opened a garage. Inside it were a couple cars. The one directly in front of them was sleek and black.

"This," Sasuke said, "is _my_ car."

Sakura nodded.

They walked past it, Sasuke running his hand over the shiny dark glass on the windows.

"I've never driven in it, but…it's still mine."

"Yeah," Itachi rolled his eyes, "because if you _did_ drive in it, you'd destroy it."

Sasuke frowned.

Sakura stifled a laugh.

Itachi walked towards a corner of the garage where a large grey sheet hung over something.

And Sasuke stopped.

"Oh, God."

Itachi pulled down the grey sheet grinning.

"Behold," he whispered. "Itachi's CAR!"

It was a van.

There were flowers, suns, hearts, and peace signs.

It was colorful, bright, optimistic and actually really beautiful.

"I've been working on it for a year! I've never driven in it! Let's go!"

Sasuke shook his head.

"No way. Theres no way I'm being seen in that."

"No! The point is we're trying to act and look different," Itachi said, "No one will expect Uchiha Sasuke to step out of a van that looks as _cool _as mine."

"No. Let's just take a different car."

"The only ones left are mom and dads. They'll kill us if they find out."

"And there's no way I'm letting you drive mine," Sasuke snapped.

"Who would want to?"

Sasuke sighed.

Then he turned to Sakura.

"I'm doing this for you," He muttered flatly so Itachi couldn't here.

She felt the heat rise in her cheeks.

"Er-thanks."

Sasuke swept his eyes away from her and glared at Itachi.

"Well?"

There was a grin.

(Itachi).

So, a minute later, they were all in Itachi's van.

Status goes as follows:

Itachi-Happy, thrilled, excited.

Sakura- Awkward, nervous, frightened.

Sasuke- Glaring, fuming, and _sincerely_ ticked off.

Figures.

They went on their way, down the road from the Uchiha house towards the City.

They passed their orange car on the way, too.

And suddenly, Itachi got this great idea.

He leaned forward and pressed a button .

Loud music thumped into the car.

It was one of Itachi's CD's.

Music thumped everywhere.

It was Itachi's kind of music, so we can easily say that Sakura thought it quite nice and didn't have a problem with it.

And based on those facts we can safely assume that Sasuke hated it.

Hated.

Hated, hated, absolutely _loathed_ with a burning passion.

Well, obviously.

**A/N: This chapter was extremely short, I know, sorry! But enjoy, and review!**


	15. Chapter 15

**A/N: Hello girls, hi guys, greetings women and men, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you so much for all the lovely reviews. Thanks for reading. **

**Also, Today's my birthday.**

**Regardless…here we go!**

**Disclaimer: GAH! Who owns Naruto? Masashi Kishimoto does! NOT ME. **

They passed all the fields, country roads, (etc) and made their way into Konoha.

Skyscrapers and buildings, people on bikes and cars and foot, people running, people walking…

It was a crowded place.

And quite suddenly…

A horrendous smell filled the van.

There was a collective gag, in which a lot of things happened at the same time:

"Ugh! Open the windows before we suffocate! Who farted?"

Sasuke turned to Sakura.

She shook her head frantically, flushing.

"Uh, no. I didn't do it."

Sasuke glared at Itachi.

"It wasn't me," Itachi said slowly, a grin spreading across his face, "Sasuke?"

The younger Uchiha sputtered:

"No Itachi! It was you!"

10 seconds later:

"Oh, all right!" his brother confessed. "Fine, I did it! But _everyone_ passes gas! You don't need to be such a meanie about it!"

"Maybe I wouldn't have to if you'd _eat_ on time!" Sasuke stuck his head out the window.

The wind pushed back on him, blowing through his hair.

It was fresh.

Sakura waved the air around her, scrunching up her face.

It was pretty gross.

They streaked through the busy streets.

Itachi pulled over into the parking lot of a huge mall.

Four stories high.

"Okay," Sasuke said, rolling up his window, "as soon as we get inside, we're going to that one store with all the hats and wigs. Keep your eyes open for Jiraiya. If you see him, let one of us know, or just hide. Or get away from him. But don't run and don't walk slow. All right?"

"Uh-huh."

"Got it."

The rosette was actually starting to seriously freak out on the inside. The fact that they were discussing what to do if they saw the dude made her feel like there was no escaping the inevitable.

Which.

Sucked.

Sasuke looked at Sakura, seeing the worry in her eyes, the way she wrapped her finger around the bottom of her shirt. He tried to put himself in her place, to feel what she was feeling right now, but couldn't do it. 'Cause he didn't know. But he didn't ask. So all he said was:

"Just follow me."

"…Right."

He hadn't forgotten the way she had been looking at him all weird and shy that morning, so Sasuke was wondering precisely what was up. But he wouldn't ask now. He'd figure it out.

Hopefully.

They jumped out of Itachi's car—excuse me—VAN, and (Sasuke kind of faster than the others) everyone got out.

Itachi locked the doors of his precious vehicle and pressed his cheek to the door.

"Good-bye, my love," he whispered, "I shall return."

Sasuke groaned quietly, his sentence consisting of more than one swear word and how he could not believe Itachi was related to him, along with the facts that his stupid van wasn't going anywhere and couldn't respond anyway, so why was his brother bothering to cry farewell to a 3 ton hunk of metal who he (Itachi) most certainly had an extremely peculiar crush on? The guy was in love with his car? What the heck?

None of his questions were answered, of course.

Sasuke shoved his hands into his pockets and all three of them crossed the parking lot and into the mall.

Sakura followed closely behind Sasuke with her head bowed.

So close, in fact, that she could smell the sweet scent of his hair.

If Sasuke noticed her breath on his neck (which he did) he didn't speak.

Speaking would humiliate himself and the girl behind him.

Wise decision, Sasuke.

The mall was packed with people everywhere.

Sasuke scanned the place for a man with long grey hair.

Not here, at least not yet.

_Come on, Sasuke!_ His conscious said. _How long do you think it'll take one guy to search the entire city for one kid? Quite a long time!_

It was right…but…

They arrived at the store.

It was massive, filled with clothes and hats and wigs and absolutely everything they needed to get their disguises.

There were a bunch of people here, too, going thru racks of things.

"Come on, Sakura!" Itachi said, grabbing her hand, "I'll show you where the wigs are!"

Sakura cast Sasuke a nervous look and allowed Itachi to drag her away.

In Sasuke's pockets, his fists were clenched.

Stupid Itachi.

He walked away, deeper into the store.

Itachi gestured towards a glass counter on one side of the store. Inside of it were many different wigs on fake heads; there were more hanging on the wall behind. But behind the counter itself was a man with brown hair and a scar across his nose.

"Hello Itachi," he said, smiling, and looked at Sakura. "And you are?"

"Um…"

Itachi gave her a look that said, _FAKE NAME!_

"My name's…Emi."

"Well, hi, Emi, I'm Iruka. And would you be interested in any wigs today?"

"Er-yeah. Something like…."

She looked into the glass counter. There were so many…

"That one?" she pointed at a wig with light green hair. 

Iruka bent down and got it out of the glass.

He lifted it up and placed it on the counter. Then he took if off the plastic head and held it out to Sakura.

She put it on.

It fit great, the green hair a little longer than her pink locks.

"Woah," Itachi said, "you look…different!"

"Is that…good or bad?"

"Most definitely good, dearest!"

She grinned and turned back to Iruka.

"How much?"

"That particular one is, with tax, about 35 dollars."

"Oh, um."

She took off the wig.

Sakura reached into her pocket and took out her wallet.

She struggled with the wallet at first, but pulled out enough money and gave it to Iruka.

Little did she know, a small piece of paper fluttered out of her wallet and onto the floor. It read:

_Sakura. Use this as you wish. From: Fugaku._

But she didn't notice.

Iruka counted her money, rang up the wig and asked: "would you like that in a bag?"

"Uh, no. Thanks."

He beamed and handed the wig back.

Sakura closed her wallet and put it in her pocket.

She put the wig on her head and Itachi showed her the way to another side of the store.

In another glass counter, there were contact lenses.

Sakura got blue, Itachi got green.

Then Itachi went over to a large hat rack. And there, his prized goal….

"Sombrero!" he shrieked, and ran up to it, grabbing the large hat and plunking it onto his head.

"It…uh, suits you." Sakura said.

"Why, thank you very much."

"Now I need some facial hair!"

They went over to another side of the store and Itachi purchased a beard.

With sideburns.

And a mustache.

He was certainly enjoying himself.

They stepped away from the facial hair counter and Itachi proudly held his head high, looking at himself in the mirror.

And Sasuke's voice sounded behind them:

"Ugh. Itachi, you didn't."

"He did," Sakura laughed, turning around—

And she froze.

If it's possible, Uchiha Sasuke looked more dashing than before, with his black robin hood hat, from which a silver feather protrude from, at an askew, rakish, totally AWESOME manner. One corner of the hat covered his right eye, and his left eye, from what Sakura could see, had a dark purple contact lens over it.

Which. Was. So. Cool.

A lazy, slow smirk fell across his lips after seeing the expression on her face.

"Wow," Sakura blustered, "you look…really, uh…good."

Then she clamped a hand over her mouth.

_Oops._

_Can't believe I just said that! I can't BELIEVE I just said that! _

Sasuke arched an eyebrow.

"Thanks," he said, looking at her, "You too."

Sakura pulled down her hand and stuffed it into her pocket, having some suicidal thoughts because of how stupid she was.

"Wow, brother," Itachi said, pouting, "that looks cool. But how awesome do I look? Don't you like the beard?"

Sasuke nodded sarcastically.

"So," he said, turning to Sakura, "where's that list my mom gave you? We might as well get started."

"Yeah…" Sakura said, starting to pull out the napkin from her pocket when suddenly—

Her stomach grumbled.

She held her tummy.

And then Itachi's rumbled, too.

"I'm hungry!" he declared, "can we get food?"

They hadn't eaten much for breakfast that day, just whatever they could find fast enough to stuff into their mouths.

Which was next to nothing.

"Yeah."

"I'll go," Itachi said, "you guys wait by the fountain."

"Fountain?" Sakura asked, clueless.

Itachi waved and zipped through the store and back into the mall.

Sakura blinked at his form, then turned her eyes to Sasuke.

His eyebrows were raised, his mouth bent slightly into a daring smirk.

A smirk that caused Sakura's heart to give a trill.

"Shall I be your escort to the fountain?" he asked, holding out his arm.

"You certainly shall," she said, taking his arm.

He pulled her close.

Sasuke led her farther into the store. A couple minutes later, they came to a garage door opening.

It was pretty big, with light flooding out from it.

They stepped through it, and Sakura found herself outside.

Uchiha and Haruno walked down the street and turned right by a building.

There was a clearing with a fountain in the center. It was a tree carved out of pure silver, and from all the branches and some leaves water poured forth into the basin below. The fountain was rimmed with white marble. People were everywhere, and sidewalks lined the sides of the cement clearing. Glass windows full of beautiful things were displayed.

"Town square," Sasuke said.

He led her over to a bench a little ways away from the fountain, above which a magnolia tree grew. The pretty pink flowers were in bloom, stretched out upon the green leaves.

They sat.

Sakura felt awkward and nervous.

She shuffled her feet.

Sasuke looked at her sidelong.

She glanced at him.

"So, um." She said, starting conversation, "those flowers are really nice."

"…Yeah..."

The water gently flowed in the fountain. The wind blew. Kids laughed.

Far away, the train blew it's horn.

Suddenly, a magnolia flower unlatched itself and slowly floated downward, the breeze carrying it toward Sakura.

And it landed on her head.

She didn't see, of course, because the flowers are so delicately light, and she was nervous as heck.

But Sasuke saw.

He turned to her and leaned forward, reaching up suddenly.

Sakura didn't expect that, and she felt herself go hot as he grazed her arm.

"Sasuke?"

He pulled away and sat back, the flower in his hand.

"It was on your head."

"Oh."

He twirled the short stem betwixt his fingers for a second or two, as if recalling some old memory, and finally, he held it out to her, looking away.

"Here," he said, "you can have it."

"Thanks," She whispered, trying to get the flower by the stem without touching Sasuke.

It didn't exactly work, as you can imagine.

She felt his fingers brush hers, and took hold of the stem, or at least she thought, but Sasuke had let go, so the flower fell.

Onto the bench between them.

Sasuke brought his violet eyes up from the petals and met Sakura's blue ones.

Sasuke had a weird thought, just then.

Sakura felt like Sasuke was thinking something that she knew was the truth.

And right when Sakura opened her mouth to speak—

Out of nowhere, a girl with bright red hair plopped down on the bench beside Sasuke.

"Hey, Sasuke-_baby_."

She wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled him closer to her.

"Get off me, Karin," Sasuke muttered angrily.

The girl, Karin, pouted, but didn't release her hold.

"Why are you in this disguise? You know I'd recognize you anywhere, anytime, anyplace."

"Well, that's not creepy," Sakura said.

Karin just seemed to notice her.

"Sasuke? Who's this?"

"She's my," Sasuke cleared his throat, "sister."

"Oh, really? Does she live with you?"

"Yes. Get off."

Sasuke was never one to hit a girl, (it was beneath him) but he was seriously considering shoving Karin off as fast as he could.

Karin felt jealousy boiling within her.

Sakura frowned as Karin leaned in towards Sasuke.

Karin pouted again, her face hovering dangerously close to Sasuke's.

He was sliding away from Karin, glaring at her.

Sakura felt like pushing that girl off of Sasuke, but didn't want it to look like she liked him, so bit her lip and tried to look away but couldn't. She felt a rusty taste come up through her throat. She swallowed it down.

And Karin saw.

Suddenly, she smiled lethally.

"Sasuke, I think this girl's got a crush on you."

Sasuke blinked, and turned to Sakura, his lips slightly parted.

_What?_

Sakura blinked rapidly, leaning back.

She started stammering: "W-what? No. No way, uh, I—"

Karin giggled.

"It's true, isn't it?"

Sakura felt her eyes go hot with humiliation, hurt and fear.

She wanted to get far, far away. Sasuke was just staring at her and Karin was laughing.

_No. No. No! How could she know! How could she say that? _

Sakura couldn't take it.

Suddenly, she stood and turned to go, but Sasuke grabbed her wrist.

"Get out of here, Karin. Leave."

She made a face, and twirled her finger around her hair.

"Are you sure, Sasuke?"

He shot her a menacing, vicious glare.

She jumped and went away, disappearing behind a street.

Sasuke pulled Sakura down beside him.

He said nothing, just loosened his fingers from around her wrist, and after a second, pulled away.

Petals fell from the tree above.

Sakura swallowed hard.

"So..." she whispered, completely embarrassed, "who was that?"

"One of my ex-girlfriends," he shook his head, "I have no idea what I was thinking when I agreed to go out with her."

"…Yeah."

"…And…what she said, uh, about you…liking me—don't feel awkward. Karin's always lying."

Sakura nodded slowly, trying not to cry.

So then that was it.

He wouldn't even tell her how he felt— what he thought.

He was probably laughing at her on the inside.

Sasuke picked up the magnolia flower and spun it around in his fingers again.

He looked sidelong at her and said:

"Unless…it wasn't a lie."

Sakura jerked up, her face going red, and stared at him.

Time for the truth.

Or not?

Or…or…or what?

"Uh...I…I—"

"I smell love in the air!" Itachi's voice sounded behind them.

Sakura was glad she didn't have to finish that sentence.

They turned around and saw him standing there, Panera Bread bags hanging from his arms.

The sweet smell of bagels drifted towards them.

"You took your time," Sasuke said savagely.

"Nah. I was hiding behind those bushes and listening to you guys talk."

"…Fantastic," Sasuke said sarcastically.

Then he turned, locked eyes with Sakura, and gently pushed the flower into her hands.

**A/N: Hi! Review, please!**


	16. Chapter 16

**A/N: Hi. Thanks to my readers and reviewers.**

**Just a note, I suffered from extremely severe writers block when writing this chapter. It's a late update, I know, but…yeah. **

**Oh yeah, and I was just learning viola so my left shoulder is like...I dunno…tingling from the shoulder rest and the weight of the instrument. It hurts a little. Seriously, I learned the notes of violin, then the strings of viola, then twinkle twinkle little star on viola. Though my bow playing is all right, sometimes it sounds like a cat screeching. So yeah. **

**Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto. **

Sakura put the flower at her side, on the bench.

They ate their Panera bread bagels, Itachi handing out cream cheese and all that. Sakura covered her hazelnut bagel with cool cream cheese.

She kept herself from meeting eyes with Sasuke.

Not like it was even possible, because Itachi planted himself down between them.

She was so close to spilling her heart out before.

So, so close.

_He'd just laugh_, Sakura tried to convince herself.

Sakura inhaled the scent of her bagel, biting into it. They'd had Panera once or twice back at home, kind of a delicacy. Her father occasionally brought it home from work, but it'd been forever since she last had it.

She felt nauseated again, just like yesterday, but kept the tears in this time. She decided she wouldn't get emotional in front of the Uchiha brothers, didn't she?

Right.

A couple minutes later:

"So!" Itachi said, swallowing, "where are we off to first?"

Sakura pulled out the list from her pocket.

"It says…'2 different electronics'."

Sasuke finished eating and stood, shoving his hands into his pockets.

"Well. Let's go."

Itachi grabbed the empty bags and pushed them together.

He stood.

Sakura followed suit, brushing crumbs from her hands. She picked up the magnolia from the bench, and followed Itachi and Sasuke across the square.

She spun it between her fingers, and, at the last second, slowly tucked it into her hair.

Itachi stuffed the trash into a trash can, and they walked back into the mall.

Back into the store.

Karin was nowhere to be seen.

Suddenly Itachi slowed, keeping pace with Sakura.

He flashed a grin, which caused his mustache to spread kind of weirdly above his lip.

"You shouldn't walk behind us all alone like that."

Sakura shrugged.

"Anyway…" Itachi said, "so…did you like my timing?"

At first the rosette didn't get it.

Then she figured out he was talking about how politely he interrupted Sakura about to spill her guts to Sasuke, the truth or lies, whichever they may have been, he had cut in. Perfectly.

"O-oh. Haha. Yeah. Absolutely. Thanks. He was actually about to know that I—"

And so now Itachi knew.

Sakura clamped a hand over her mouth.

Oh, Dang.

His foxy grin turned less annoying and more amused.

"Very cool, Sakura."

He knew! ACK! He knew how she felt about…Sasuke…and…and…ah, crap.

"Listen, Itachi," she hissed frantically, "you can't tell him. Please. Please!"

"Don't worry," he whispered, "I won't. I'll let you two play this game."

Sakura sighed with complete relief.

Good.

"It'll be quite fun to watch, actually," he said as they entered the actual mall.

Sakura made an irritated face.

Sasuke stopped and half turned around then.

"You guys had better not be whispering about me."

"You?" Itachi laughed, putting his hands up in defense, "haha! YOU! Why would we be talking about you? Of all people! Ha! 'You', he says," Itachi nudged Sakura, "what an odd subject to discuss!" 

"All right. Shut up."

Itachi shot Sakura a satisfied smirk.

"So," he said, "to the electronic store!"

To the electronic store.

When they got there a little later, Sakura leaned over the counter, looking at all the different types of phones. Itachi was to her left, Sasuke on her right. Sasuke had his arms crossed across his chest and his back was against the counter. He looked kind of bored.

Sakura picked out a sleek green and black phone that slid open.

After she had paid for warranty and all that, she sought to pick out a case.

She searched and decided on a silver one with black stars. Some green lightning was scattered around it.

The whole process of bargaining with the clerk, finding everything, and buying the stuff took a while.

After that, they sat down on the cool floor of the mall. People were buzzing around.

Sakura pulled out the napkin from her pocket.

"Okay," she said, "next is…clothes."

"Can we skip that 'till the end?" Sasuke moaned flatly.

This whole running around the mall and standing up for an hour thing was taking its toll. Besides, shopping was never one of his favorite pass times.

"Uh, yeah. After that is…shoes."

Sasuke and Itachi groaned.

"We'll just put that with clothes. Next, Jewelry."

And so they got up and went to the jewelry store. Sakura picked out a necklace with a turquoise moon on a pendant. After that, they went to another store and got a bag. It was dark purple corduroy with lots of pockets. It hung across Sakura's chest. They got socks from the same store.

A few hours passed. Many hours.

At this point, Sasuke was trying to keep himself sane.

_Shopping!_ He thought with slight disgust. _Especially girl shopping! I'd have more fun staring at a wall! _

Sakura was putting all her stuff in her bag.

"A washable tattoo…" she whispered, "where do we get that?"

Itachi's face lit up suddenly, "I know!" He dragged her and Sasuke up 2 floors and to a cart in the middle of some of the stores. There was a woman there with a tattoo station.

They approached her.

After a couple minutes, Sakura had a sparkly purple Saturn on her arm.

Itachi wanted to get a watermelon on his cheek, but his current facial hair situation did not allow him to do so. The mustache.

Anyway, Sasuke refused a tattoo.

"What's left?" he asked.

"Books."

They went to the bookstore.

5 minutes later, Sakura was out, purchasing two of her favorite novels.

They went back downstairs.

First floor.

It was night, but as usual, the mall was still crowded with people.

"I'll go put this stuff in the car and get dinner," Itachi said with a grin. Disappearing with Sakura's bag.

Sakura and Sasuke went back outside to the square.

The fountain had lights in it now, and the breeze was still blowing, and the bench they were sitting on before was vacant.

They slumped down onto it.

The cool concrete rose within them. Sasuke was on the right, Sakura on the left.

Water ran gently down into the fountain. Petals drifted from the magnolia tree.

Again, far away, the train screamed.

Sakura and Sasuke were tired.

Sakura rested her head on the back of the bench, staring up at the sky. It was bleak indigo gray, and a sliver of crescent moon shone in the sky. It was dim, because of the glittering lights of the city, but it was there. Above it was a dark purple cloud. Above the cloud was the only star she could see. It was bright, despite all the smog in Konoha.

Wind blew.

They said nothing. Sasuke wasn't about to start up the conversation they'd been having before.

Too awkward.

Sakura told herself not to fall asleep. She wouldn't do it. She had to be alert. After they ate, they still had to go get clothes and shoes.

The rosette sighed, her eyes fluttering close. She opened them.

A few minutes later, when she started nodding into sleep, she felt herself lean to the right…to Sasuke…

She jerked away, blinking, face hot.

"Sorry," she mumbled, trying to keep awake.

Sasuke looked at her sidelong, smirking.

"Go ahead and sleep if you want."

"Nah…" Sakura whispered, "I'm not sleepy."

She yawned.

"Right."

"…oh, fine."

After a moment's thought, Sakura scooted back a bit, then curled into a ball on her side.

He head was next to Sasuke's thigh, and the concrete felt cool against her skin.

She shut her eyes, adjusting the magnolia flower in her hair.

Sasuke pushed his hands into his pockets.

A few minutes later:

"And don't be scared," he said quietly out of nowhere, "I told you…I'd be here for you."

"You…did…"

And suddenly, sleep caught her.

Her breathing went even.

A few minutes later:

A light breeze blew.

Cool night air ruffled Sasuke's hair. He closed his eyes, then opened them.

Slowly, he pulled out his hand from his pocket, and ran his fingers along the back of Sakura's hand. The soft skin was slightly cold.

She didn't stir.

He reached up and took his hat off his head. Sasuke watched the silver feather catch the light, then smoothed it back.

After a while, he put it in his lap, then folded his arms behind his head.

And he looked up.

Meanwhile…

Back in the store on the first floor (from which Sakura bought the wig) Iruka was sweeping the area in front of his counter. The dust rose up in small breezes.

He whistled to himself.

And suddenly, his broom connected with something odd.

He reached down and picked up a small piece of paper.

It read: "_Sakura. Use this as you wish. From: Fugaku._"

And his mouth went dry.

Haruno…Haruno Sakura. Fugaku…Uchiha.

And it clicked.

"Oh, my…" he whispered, and launched himself behind his desk, grappling for the phone. He dialed in a number.

After a few rings, someone picked up.

"Hello, sir. It's Iruka reporting…yes. Yes I have. Haruno Sakura is here, was here, in my store….yes. She's here in the mall, I believe. I'll…I'll contact them upstairs to keep on the lookout. She is traveling with an Uchiha. I only saw the older one. Hurry, sir! She's around here somewhere…And she's wearing a wig of green hair. Yes. Yes. All right, Sir."

He hung up the phone after giving the address of the mall.

He slipped the paper into his pocket.

He walked around his counter and picked up his broom.

Iruka resumed his sweeping.

Elsewhere…

Jiraiya snapped his phone shut and threw it onto the seat next to him. He sped back around and zipped down the street. There was some honking.

Jiraiya wanted to stick his head out the window and curse, but decided if they saw him, they'd probably call the police.

He thought better of it.

"You ready back there, Deidara, Pain?" he grunted.

"Oh, yeah…"

"Yes."

Jiraiya gripped the steering wheel, his knuckles white.

His eyes were narrowed, thinking of the girl he was going to murder tonight.

And then he smiled.

_I'm coming, dear little Haruno, _he thought, stepping on the gas, _I'm coming._

**A/N: He's coming you guys! OH NO! I kind of regret making Jiraiya the villain after reading the manga chapter of Shippuden where he dies, but…yeah. I also feel like I was boring you lot up there with all that shopping. Anyway. REVIEW. **


	17. Chapter 17

**A/N: Heys! Thanks to my readers and reviewers!**

**Disclaimer: I'm getting sick of these things. I don't own Naruto. **

Sakura was gently shaken awake; there was a warm hand on her shoulder.

Her eyes opened slowly.

And she looked up into the face of Uchiha Sasuke.

Itachi was standing next to him with two Subway bags and 3 drinks in a drink holder thing.

"Aw, man," Itachi wailed, "I wanted to wake her up."

"By screaming 'Sakura' in her ear," Sasuke said, helping her sit up.

The rosette rubbed the sleep out of her eyes, stretching.

There were less people in the square, but the fountain lights were still on, the petals were still falling, the moon was still out.

Itachi sat down on Sasuke's right this time, squishing rosette and raven haired closer.

He passed Sakura and Sasuke sandwich and drink then started eating at his own.

10 minutes later…

Sakura ate the last of her dinner, swallowing the bit of bread left.

"All right," Itachi said, grinning, "let's get this clothes and shoes thing over with."

The three of them stood.

Itachi pushed the subway bags and trash into the trashcan.

This time, Sasuke walked by Sakura, Itachi following them.

They hadn't gone 10 yards until—

Suddenly, a man jumped into their way.

Sakura thought two words: _Grey hair._

Everything happened so fast, no one had time to think.

He stepped towards Sasuke.

Sasuke grabbed Sakura's arm and yanked her backwards into Itachi.

Her back jarred into his (Itachi's) chest.

The man made his eyes wide and grabbed Sasuke's shirt collar, pulling him towards him.

The Robin Hood hat fell to the ground.

His mouth was hanging open, and he leaned in towards Sasuke's face.

"YOU SIR!" He shouted, "do you like TOASTERS?"

Sasuke blinked.

"…what…happens if I say no?"

"I shall stalk you forever until my dying day!"

"Right. Well, let's do the toasters justice. Yes. I do."

"Why do you think so?"

"They're useful in toasting _toast_."

The man released Sasuke.

He pulled out a clip board and scribbled something down.

"Oh. Okay. I was just taking a survey." He stood back. "Good Night."

The man walked away, scanning the square (no doubt) for his next victim.

Sasuke made a slight face.

"Well."

"That was…" Itachi said, "um. Strange, huh?"

Sakura could barely squeak a reply.

Itachi had her by the arms (she was practically slumping to the ground) because her knees buckled a minute ago.

_So close…so close…_

"Hey, you okay, Sakura?"

And she burst.

She leapt up and spun around.

"No! No, I'm not okay!" She shouted, "What if that guy was Jiraiya? What would we have done? What would _you guys_ have done? He'd just pick me up and go stuff me in a closet somewhere! Then he'd stab me with a—a—sword or something! There's someone out to kill me! I don't know how to fight! I can't defend myself! I'm as good as dead!"

They stared at her.

A slight silence had fallen over the square.

Sakura's jaw dropped.

"No," she whispered, her hands rising to her mouth, "I can't believe I said that. I just...I…I'm such an idiot! I'm sorry!"

She turned around and collapsed to the ground on her knees, trying to keep from herself from crying…

It didn't work.

The first drop of saltwater slid down her cheek.

She was always messing up. Always doing this.

That must've stung them. Itachi and Sasuke were trying to keep her safe— It's not like they'd just stand there and watch her get carried off—

A hand on her shoulder.

She rubbed a fist across her face to wipe the tears away.

"I can't handle this," she whispered, swallowing hard.

"Yes you can, Sakura," Itachi said, crouching down beside her. "Look, I know we can't possibly imagine how you feel, but, we'll be here! Really! Sasuke didn't fight or anything because that guy—"

"—was taking a survey about toasters." Sasuke said.

"Yes!" Itachi went on, "he wasn't a danger. If someone does come up and tries to carry you away, me and Sasuke—"

"—we won't let him stuff you into a closet."

"Yeah!" Itachi finished.

"..You're right," Sakura said, ticked off at herself, "I'm sorry I said all that. Really."

"Don't be sorry."

Sakura and Itachi turned around to see Sasuke put his hat back upon his head, pulling it over one eye.

"Besides," he said, thrusting his hands into his pockets, "it's not like any of this is your fault."

"…Yeah."

Itachi helped Sakura up, and they made their way back into the mall. Sakura fell into step by Sasuke, and Itachi walked alone and unhappily behind them. Sorry, Itachi.

Sasuke stared straight ahead, occasionally flicking his onyx orbs at the floor.

Sakura darted her eyes left and up at him, trying to find some way to say something, to apologize, to tell the truth, but…she couldn't.

After roaming around the store for a little bit, they came up to a store on the second floor, right hand side, with flashy lights and cool stuff. Sakura stepped toward it, but Sasuke caught her shoulder, pulling her back.

"You shouldn't go in there. That's Karin's families' place."

Sakura turned to him. "I actually do want to go in. Why not?"

"'Cause she'll try to do something stupid, trust me."

"Like what?"

"Do you really want to know?"

"No. But it's late…and, look they have a sale going on! Come on! Let's just get this over with fast then go home! Can she really be that bad?"

"…Yes. But fine."

Sakura walked fast into the store.

Sasuke exchanged glances with Itachi and they followed her in.

5 minutes later…

Sakura held up two T-shirts and a pair of blue shoes.

"I'm gonna go try these on, okay? So we don't have to waste money. I don't have much left."

"I do," Sasuke said.

"I can't take your money, Sasuke! But thanks."

"Fine," he said, shrugging and leaned against the wall outside the fitting rooms. Itachi sat down next to him.

Sakura went up to the desk and asked if she could go in.

The woman behind the desk (Karin's mom) opened her mouth slightly when she saw Sakura.

_Green wig…blue eyes… Haruno Sakura. This was the girl Iruka had described. _

"Oh, yeah, sure!" she said a little too quickly. "I'll show you in."

Karin popped out from behind the desk.

Her mom led Sakura over to the room. She opened the door and beckoned Sakura in.

The rosette stepped in and hung up the clothes on the hook and set the shoes on the bench.

It was kind of dim in the room.

Karin's mom came in and closed the door behind her.

Outside, Sasuke felt alarm rise in his throat, but knew there wasn't anywhere Karin's mom could take Sakura, so, not to worry. She'd have to kidnap her first. Plus, it's not like she'd kill her in a fitting room.

…Right?

Sakura blinked.

"Um…"

"Sorry, I just have to turn on the...other light." Karin's mom went by Sakura and to the wall behind her, where there was another door. She pulled out a ring of keys and selected one, opening the door. There was a staircase. "It's over here," the woman said, reaching into the door. She grappled the wall for the so-called "light switch."

Why was it even there?

Suddenly, the woman turned to Sakura, smiling a small, dangerous smile.

There was no light.

She came forward.

Sakura took a step back, and before she could scream, the woman reached up and did something, she punched her somewhere, but the next thing she (Sakura) knew, darkness swallowed our hero.

Unconsciousness overtook her.

It was happening.

Before Sakura hit the ground, Karin's mom caught her, and flipped her around. She pulled a rope from her pocket and bound the girl's wrists', along with her feet.

The woman stepped down into the staircase.

All the way to the bottom, where she waited for a moment.

_Come on, come on…_

A man stepped out from the shadows.

"Jiraiya sent me just in case you found dear little Sakura," Deidara said, pushing the blonde hair out of his face.

"Took you long enough," The woman snapped, "here, I've got her."

Deidara hefted a large sack from over his shoulder and opened it.

Karin's mom dumped Sakura into it.

She turned around and ran back up the stair case, shutting and locking the door, then pretending to talk to Sakura when she said, "Yep. And you can put the hangers over here. Yeah. Okay."

She slipped out of the fitting room and shut the door.

Sasuke cast her a look, but other than that, he didn't know.

Below…

Deidara closed the sack and tied the top of it, pulling it over his shoulder.

He walked down a ramp, then opened a door at the bottom.

Closing it behind him, Deidara looked both ways, then walked into the darkness, his footsteps silent in the depth of night.

**A/N: …And the fun begins. Review! **


	18. Chapter 18

**A/N: Hi.**

**On Wednesday, I received my very first actual flame. Yeah, and the flamer didn't sign in or hasn't signed up, so there is no way I can reply. Anyway, I just want to say: please don't flame me. If there is something wrong with my story or you want to give me some constructive criticism, or anything, be nice about it, okay? Because flames hurt.**

**Badly. **

**Right, so thanks to all my NICE reviewers. Thank you so much you guys! Thanks to the readers. (Also, insulting Sasuke is fine! Insult any character you like when a little insulting is necessary! XD ) **

**Oh yeah, I'm going to say something else! Recently, I had a dream that I was in LOVE with Shikamaru. Yeah. SHIKAMARU. I've never been a fan girl, but Shikamaru is awesome. We were sitting in this train, and he was leaning back against the seat with his arms behind his head. A breeze was blowing from the window, like, ruffling his hair, sunlight was splashing, he was talking to me, but I forget what he was saying. It was so…real. I dunno. Yeah, *face goes red* shutting up now. **

**Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto. **

Deidara walked a little bit through the streets until he was far away from people, then flipped out his phone, dialing a number he knew by absolute heart. There was a ring. Then someone picked up.

On the other end, Jiraiya didn't bother with the pleasantries.

"Do you have her?"

"I do, my man."

"Good. Wait a minute, if you would. Which you will."

Deidara waited patiently until the gray car pulled up in front of him. The blonde haired jumped into it next to a very bored Pain.

_He_ was tossing a coin up and down, catching it in his fingers then throwing it up again. Deidara was always the one on the important missions. He always got the adventure. Pain was just back up. He had to sit, watch, and (among other things) entertain Jiraiya while the gray haired man grew impatient and extremely ticked off.

Which was kind of unfair.

So you can imagine how deep in the doldrums he was (as such with every mission he was partnered up with Deidara) when the artist plopped down at his right with a large sack in his lap. This container probably contained the girl Jiraiya was looking for.

But Pain could've cared less.

This whole business was wrong, he decided, but money was needed, and he _was_ an evil genius, after all…You just can't put that kind of talent to waste, you know.

Jiraiya streaked off before Deidara could shut his door.

"Had fun?" Pain asked in a low voice.

"Lots."

"Good," he said half-heartedly, leaning on the windowsill, pocketing his coin. The cool breeze blew in his face.

_Not fair. Not fair. Not fair. _

Jiraiya sped through the city, took an exit and then an old road through some run down buildings. Dark alleys and streets without life. After scanning the perimeter, he pulled up to an abandoned factory behind a thicket of trees. It was completely unseen behind the woods.

"Yes," he hissed, peering through the wind shield, "this is the place. This is perfect."

They got out of the car, Deidara grabbing the bag.

"You did an excellent job," Jiraiya said to him, "so Pain can hold that."

A quick grin.

The sack was shoved into his arms.

Pain frowned but held his tongue.

It's not like he even had anything to say, he couldn't come up with snappy remarks from the top of his head. He was mulling over these thoughts as they entered the building. It was dark, but they found a light switch and some fluorescent light spilled into the room. The place wasn't very big, but it was enough. Some glass windows scattered against the walls.

Jiraiya kicked some rubble out of the way, clearing a spot.

"Here," he was ordering, "open it."

Pain knelt and put the sack down. There were tiny air holes in it. He untied the top of it and spread it out. He reached in and pulled out the kid.

He set her down.

Her hands and feet were bound, and she was unconscious. Something caught Pain's eye. A tattoo. There was a sparkly purple planet on her arm, it was shiny and smooth.

_Weird_.

The grey-haired man sat down beside Pain and pulled a roll of duck tape from his belt. (This belt had weapons in it: a gun, more than a couple knives, and said roll of tape.)

He taped her mouth shut.

Pain looked at him, arching an eyebrow.

"So she can't scream, idiot."

Jiraiya stood, crossing his arms across his chest.

Behind him, Deidara sat.

"Now what?"

Jiraiya turned to Pain, dark eyes glittering.

"We wait," he said, "we wait for her to wake up."

Elsewhere…

Sasuke slid to the ground, his back to the tire of Itachi's van. Around him, the red and blue flashing lights of the police cars made the world seem surreal and different, strange and unordinary.

He'd figured out something was wrong when Sakura didn't come out of the fitting room. He'd kicked down the door, called the police. Karin's mom tried to get away but was arrested. The officers searched the mall, all of it, outside of it, and spread out into the city to search for Sakura and the kidnappers. Because they were the sons of Uchiha Fugaku, captain of the police force, they said Itachi and Sasuke could not be put in danger by going with the officers around the city. They told them it didn't matter, Sakura came first, but did they listen?

Nooooooooo.

So they were here, in the parking lot with police everywhere.

The wait was horrible.

Not knowing what was happening to her, being completely helpless to act.

Sasuke had taken out the violet contact lenses and the hat, which was beside him right now.

"Sasuke."

It was his brother. Itachi had taken off all the facial hair and the sombrero, along with the contacts.

The older Uchiha sat down to Sasuke's left.

For a while, there was silence. Then:

"Itachi…this is all my fault. I said I'd be there for her. "

Itachi shook his head. "How is it your fault? There's no way you could have known."

"Yeah…but still. I took too long. Didn't notice. We shouldn't have gone into that store. I was getting tired, loosing focus…" (Plus a bunch of reviewers hate me.)

"Listen," Itachi said, sitting by his brother, "If…Sakura isn't alive—"

Sasuke glared steel.

"Don't say that."

"If-if we can't _find_ her…I…I think she'd have wanted me to know…she liked you, Sasuke. Really. More than just friends."

After a minute, Sasuke clenched his fingers in the gravel.

"You're kidding."

"No joke," Itachi said slowly, looking at his hands, feeling guilty. He said he wouldn't tell, but…if they never saw her again…

Sasuke shook his head. No.

All right, so he wasn't _completely_ dense as a rock, but when the girls at school said they 'liked' him, they acted flirty and obnoxious. He was so used to it. That's what he expected. So he'd never thought anyone would act…different.

He should've told her how he felt.

_And Now…_

He wrenched his eyes shut.

_Now it was too late. _

"So, um," Itachi said, "I called mom and dad. They're still at the hospital. Mom might come, but there's nothing they can do, so…"

Sasuke said nothing.

"Yeah. Well. I'll let you be…alone."

Itachi put his hand on Sasuke's shoulder; then lifted it off. His footsteps became quieter as he strode away.

A couple hours later:

Sakura opened her eyes.

They widened.

She tried to move but couldn't. Shock came after that. She had been kidnapped. KIDNAPPED. Surrounded by people she didn't know, tied up and helpless.

There was a man next to her, a guy more like. Older than Itachi. Twenty five, at least.

He frowned as she stirred, trying to sit straight.

"She's up."

A figure stepped out of the shadows.

It was him.

Jiraiya cackled loudly and walked past another guy with blonde hair.

"Finally!" He hissed, "finally."

He came up to Sakura, who was on her side, on the ground.

His lips curved upward into a sneering smile.

"Take that stuff off. I want to see who you really are when I end you."

He had her bounds cut.

She sat up and took a deep breath from her nose, moving mechanically.

With shaking hands, Sakura pulled off the green wig, the magnolia flower fluttering to the ground. She pulled out the blue contact lenses.

"Good…" Jiraiya murmured, kneeling down in front of her, pink hair and emerald eyes. "that's better. You look just like your parents. Before I killed them. And you know something else?"

He leaned forward, his mouth next to her ear.

"I enjoyed it."

Hate and rage filled Sakura; if she didn't have duck tape over her lips she would have spat at him.

_I hate you,_ she thought, _I hate you more than anything. _

He smiled, then stood.

"Okay, sweetheart, let's do this."

He pulled a gun from his belt.

"The door, Pain," he barked to the guy next to her, "watch it."

The guy, Pain, nodded and made his way to the door, sitting down by it and looking out a window next to it.

Fear gripped Sakura as Jiraiya loomed over her. You'd think thoughts and feelings would flash through her, but except for being afraid, nothing did. She was numb and completely…dazed.

It's just going to go like that. The click out of life when you die. _I so do not want to die now…not like this, not here…_

And then she had a thought.

She mumbled something.

"What?" he shouted.

Sakura pointed to her mouth which was sealed with tape.

"You got something to say?"

She nodded quickly, a plan forming in her mind. There was only one door. Pain was there. The other guy in the back looked amused and bored, but otherwise alert. If she could just get by him…Windows were above her head, to high too reach at her height…

Jiraiya ripped the duck tape off her mouth.

Her lips stung and she clenched her eyes shut for a moment, taking in the pain.

She opened them.

"Why…" her voice was trembling. She cleared her throat. "Why are you doing this? Why do you want me dead?"

Jiraiya laughed.

"You think I'd tell you? Fat chance, love."

She shook her head.

"I deserve to know."

He rammed the barrel of his gun into her cheek.

Her head was jerked to the left, but she yanked it back, feeling her eyes go hot.

"Don't talk back."

Sakura's lip trembled with anger.

"Anyway, sweetheart," he said, "it's over."

Her raised the gun to her head, stepping on her foot so she couldn't move. His hand pinned her arms against the wall.

Oh, God, no.

No, no, no…

He didn't bother to waste time.

Sakura shut her eyes, biting her lip as tears streaked down her face.

It's going to end like this…

He pulled the trigger.

There was a click…

And nothing came out.

Sakura snapped her eyes open.

Jiraiya froze.

Then he twitched.

And he stood and glared at his partners.

He was fuming. And then he roared:

"WHO THE _HECK_ USED UP ALL MY GOSH DARN _BULLETS_!"

There was some nervous laughter from behind him.

"Sorry," the blonde man said, "I was practicing shooting at the trees in the back yard."

"I said use a gun and practice."

"You never said which gun."

"So you took mine."

"I took yours!"

Jiraiya groaned and threw the gun at the floor. "Idiot."

Sakura was breathing deeply with relief.

_I need a plan…_

"Okay," Jiraiya said, pulling a knife from his pocket.

He unsheathed it, then swung it under Sakura's chin. He held her back against the wall again.

She squeezed her eyes shut.

"_Now_ it's over."

**A/N: Uh oh. Yeah, sorry it was kind of rushed…but review! **


	19. Chapter 19

**A/N: Hey everyone :D Thanks to all the readers and reviewers.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto. **

An image of her mother popped into Sakura's mind, one where she was laughing a nice, warm laugh—

The blade of the knife fell down, skimming Sakura's right leg.

Sharp pain burst from there, the cut immediately drawing blood; it wasn't very much, but it was still bleeding.

Jiraiya stared in horror at the hilt in his hand. The blade had simply fallen out. Just. PLOP.

Then he screamed:

"WHAT DO YOU FOOLS DO WITH MY WEAPONS ALL DAY?"

"Play," Pain said.

Jiraiya chucked the hilt at the orange haired (he dodged), cursing curses Sakura didn't know existed.

"Actually," Pain said, picking up the leather base of the knife, "this is mine."

"What?"

"You took it from me yesterday. I was stabbing trees while Deidara was shooting them."

Jiraiya waved him off. "Right. Whatever."

He stood and pulled another knife.

"All right, Haruno."

Before he could throw it, there was a crash, and something flew through the window, knocking the knife out of his hand. Glass shattered as a figure stepped lightly out of the sill and onto the floor.

"Kakashi?"

"Hey Sakura. And hooligans."

Hatake Kakashi pulled a pair of broadswords from the hilt on his back and took a battle stance in front of Sakura. Also, slung on his back, was his violin. The bow was nowhere to be seen. Pain stood by the door, not leaving his post, while Deidara and Jiraiya flew at Kakashi from opposite sides, both pulling knives. They didn't need to think or speak: this was someone trying to rescue the prisoner. And that just wouldn't be allowed.

Sakura crawled away to the left, away from the fray, relief flooding over her. She grabbed the dagger that was taken out of Jiraiya's hands with trembling fingers.

She stood.

The musician got through the window because he was tall.

Sakura was not.

Kakashi was duel-wielding against the two, and he was rather good at it. Sakura couldn't help at all, seeing as how she couldn't fight, she couldn't act, she couldn't move. Her leg was seriously hurting now, blood trailing down her leg and into her sneakers.

There was a grunt and a jerk: Kakashi ducked as Deidara jabbed at his head, and from behind Jiraiya swung outward, and suddenly—

There was a horrid _SNAP!_ And all went froze.

Jiraiya and Deidara took a few steps back.

Everyone'd forgotten about Sakura for the time being because of the look on Kakashi's face.

He dropped his swords and lovingly took his instrument into gentle hands.

His lip trembled.

"My…Vi…o…lin!" he roared.

Kakashi turned to Jiraiya, glaring a death glare.

"Look at this!" He screamed, "you broke my D string! You cut it in two!"

Jiraiya blinked, then smirked. "Oops."

Kakashi spoke through gritted teeth: "You'll…pay for that."

He slung his violin back over his shoulder and took up his weapons. He ran at the string-snapper with a cry.

He (Jiraiya) was skilled with the knife; if offered direct blows and more control to him, more than a sword of gun, but he had to admit, keeping the guy back this time was definitely harder. Seeing as how Kakashi was filled with rage and anger, which, ultimately, gave him power.

The sharp clinks of metal on metal filled his mind, the vibrations beat through his body.

_Hang on, _he thought, _where's that girl?_

He sacrificed half a second of defense to glance once around the room.

This amount of time was enough for Kakashi.

He was caught off guard, and the next thing Jiraiya knew, a sword point dove deep into his left arm, pain exploded, blood gushed.

He clenched his teeth and snatched his hand away, the knife falling to the ground.

"Oops," Kakashi mocked.

Jiraiya faltered backwards, left arm swinging idly by his thigh, for the time being not moving. He shut his eyes. He'd just been cut in a place where an old wound had been. So it hurt more than normal. Deidara growled and sliced hard into Kakashi's thigh: his back was turned. The grey haired spun and knocked Deidara in the head with the hilt of his sword as pain exploded in his thigh. The blonde fell to the ground, unconscious.

The coins jingled in Kakashi's can as he ran (limping) at Pain. The orange haired pulled a gun, aimed at the attacker, and, without thinking:

Bang.

The bullet skimmed Kakashi's upper right arm. Blood burst as he sheathed his duel swords. He swiped the gun down as it fired again, ricocheting off the floor and into the ceiling, hitting the fluorescent lights above. Sakura ran to Kakashi's side just as a shower of sparks fell down. Jiraiya took a steps back. The sparks easily caused the sack to catch fire, which in turn, spread to the ropes and then the rubble around the room. Flames shot upwards as smoke filled the air. Pain was staring at the fire, un armed, and in this second Kakashi slammed his weight into his chest, shoving pain into a wall, then crumpled to the floor. Kakashi grabbed Sakura and they ran out the door, coughing.

If the rosette had looked behind her, she'd have seen the magnolia flower laying helplessly on the ground, the petals burning to ash in a light breeze.

But she did not.

Kakashi had sweat breaking out on his forehead, soaking up his mask. The blood from his bullet wound and the cut on his thigh bleeding freely now. Sakura's leg was cover in blood as well. It hurt so much, nothing like she'd ever felt before; but the dagger was still in her hand.

In her pocket, she had the list and her wallet.

Kakashi and Sakura limped through the thicket. She clung to the grey haired man, supporting him.

"Kakashi." She gasped, "how did you find me?"

"They left…" he spoke through gritted teeth, "the car out in the open."

He breathed deeply, struggling to maintain consciousness.

"Oh."

A moment later:

"Where'd you get the swords?"

"Traded them…for my…beloved bow."

"Must've been a good quality bow, then. You see, I play viola—"

He grunted with pain.

"…uh, yeah," Sakura finished.

She felt the bruise on her cheek swollen up and sting.

They stumbled through the woods, downhill.

"You don't…by any chance…have a cell phone on you?"

His silence said no.

It was a moonless night, not like they could even see the stars because of the trees. Though it was pitch black, she could still see the sparkly Saturn on her arm.

"Where are we going?"

"Away from them."

"You know, you still haven't told me why Jiraiya tried to kill me."

"I will. I know now."

There was a gun fire from behind them. And in the distance, they heard Jiraiya roar:

"I'm COMING, sweetheart!"

"Hurry!" Kakashi whispered. They staggered through the trees faster, and soon, they were out of the thicket. Kakashi groaned with pain as his leg gave way. Blood flowed down his thigh.

"Kakashi-Kakashi," Sakura said frantically, "we have to keep going!"

"I…don't know if I can…"

"You have to! Please, come on!"

She mustered strength and Sakura heaved him up as they heard bullets from behind.

Closer now.

Obviously, Jiraiya had taken Pain's gun, and it was loaded.

Kakashi squeezed his eyes shut and they stumbled down the deserted road, through all the abandoned houses. After a long time, they reached the fields surrounding the Uchiha residence.

There was really no benefit, because Sakura didn't have a key.

They tore through corn stalks and sugarcane, Sakura's leg becoming weaker.

A light shone.

A house not far.

"There!" Sakura whispered, "we have to get help!"

Kakashi's eyes lost focus, he was losing blood, too fast…

The two made their way to the house, the rosette dropping the dagger.

Sakura knocked frantically on the door, trying not to get blood on it.

"Hello?" she called, "please, we need help!"

There was some loud barking.

A couple seconds later there were footsteps and someone unlocked and opened the door.

The boy from before.

The one with red triangles on his face.

His eyes widened as he saw Sakura and Kakashi. At his feet the little white dog, Akamaru, Sakura recalled, was howling.

"Uh—"

"Please!" Sakura said, "we need help. Can we—"

He pulled the door farther open, letting them in.

"Kiba?" A voice called from inside, "who is it?"

Kakashi and Sakura staggered inside, getting blood on the floor.

The boy, Kiba, pulled Kakashi onto a sofa nearby.

Kiba's mom came in, another larger dog following her.

"Oh. My, God. You're the girl they're looking for."

"Yeah," Sakura said hurriedly, "that's me. Call the police, hurry, he's coming!"

Kiba's mom didn't bother asking who and grabbed a phone, dialing the number.

Kiba examined Kakashi's wounds: "Uh- this looks bad. He needs med. attention. Now."

The dark-haired looked at Sakura, "and so do you."

"I'm fine!" she said quickly, though she was not, "_he's_ coming. He saw us come here."

They blinked at her.

"Never mind! I need to go, distract him, I won't have anyone hurt because of—"

"Sakura," Kakashi croaked, "you can't—"

"I have to. It's me he wants!"

"Wait—"

But Sakura didn't stop to listen; she whirled around and zipped out the door.

She stepped into the night, scanning the fields for—

There.

A small figure running towards her.

"Hey!" she shouted, waving her arms, "over here!"

He let out some bullets into the sky.

Good. He saw her.

Sakura spun around and ran into another field behind Kiba's house.

Bullets shot past her, missing.

It was pitch black.

Sakura risked a look behind her, and when she faced front again, felt herself falling over a root.

Cold water splashed into her, as her face slammed into soft mud.

A rice paddy field.

Now chilled to the bone, Sakura staggered to her feet, wiping dirt from her eyes.

_Move it, Sakura! _

She splashed through the field.

She heard splashes behind her, too, and knew Jiraiya was closing the distance between them.

Sakura had to stay near the house so police would find her, but had to stay away from it so he wouldn't go in…couldn't turn around because he was right there...

She made out a couple trees and bushes ahead.

Bullets flew.

He was missing, but one of those were going to hit, sooner or later…Shelter…shelter…

Sakura dove behind a bush and rolled across the ground, straightening up behind a tree.

He couldn't have seen her. He'd just go past.

She hoped.

His footsteps slowed and quieting as he approached.

"Here little Haruno…"

Sakura felt her heart thump louder and louder as he came closer.

"Nowhere to go…nowhere to run…I'm here…"

He shot a couple of trees, one of them the one she was standing behind.

Sakura's breath became silent as she held it.

Closer…closer…

_Why'd you stop, Sakura? He'll get you now! You're such an idiot!_

He fired again, then stopped.

All was quiet.

No sound at all.

Wind blew.

Jiraiya stuck his head around the corner of the tree.

"Boo."

Sakura screamed and ducked as he fired again, narrowly missing her.

She ran back towards the rice field in complete darkness, nothing to light her way.

And far away, police sirens sounded.

_Yes! Yes, they're coming! _

Sakura felt her leg wound sting again as she ran through the water, kind of upset that she was destroying all this rice.

Sakura turned around, getting slightly cocky.

"Ha!" She shouted, running backwards, "you can't even hit a girl! What a weak aim you've got—"

A bullet knocked off a small part of her hair.

Right.

Sakura whirled around ran as fast as ever in between the fields.

She saw police cars pull up along the road near Kiba's house.

She waved her arms and screamed for help, and in doing so, tripped.

The cut in her leg hit sharply against a rock—pain exploded and blood spattered.

She cried out.

Sakura heard running footsteps and willed herself to get up.

But she could not.

More bullets.

Jiraiya loomed above her.

"Finally." He said, pointing the gun at her.

The police were coming.

She couldn't roll or move or think.

Police…

He pulled the trigger.

Darkness blocked out his figure and the bullet hit something hard.

There was shouting, and someone grabbed Sakura, heaving her up.

The police officer removed the riot shield from on top of Sakura, pushing Jiraiya back into the ground.

More shouting and footsteps.

"Freeze!"

Guns were pointed at the grey haired man, and they kicked his own away.

He groaned.

So…so…close…

She was safe.

A couple minutes later:

Sakura was in the ambulance with Kakashi, gripping his hand tightly as they put the oxygen mask on his face, treating his wounds.

They raced through the streets towards the hospital.

"Kakashi," Sakura whispered, "thank you so much…for saving me…"

He slowly shook his head.

"Anytime. But I should tell you…why…he tried to kill you."

Sakura swallowed.

"There's a man named Orochimaru. He's the leader of the people who hired Jiraiya."

"Okay…"

"He..figured out that…a large amount of treasure found by the government, would be going to your family. Yes, you. Haruno Sakura. Because of your lack of luxury and money, they wanted to help out a little. But Orochimaru's family was next in line. If you were…eliminated… he would get that amount of money and…"

That's it?

"Well that's kinda stupid," Sakura said, "If he'd just asked, I'd probably give it to him. They didn't have to kill my parents… and…"

They reached the hospital. Kakashi was wheeled out of the ambulance before he could say another word.

"Ms. Haruno," a police officer in the van said, "what now? You need medical attention."

Sakura winced as she moved her leg.

"Nah, I'm okay," she said quickly.

She was not.

"Can we go back to the mall?"

"Excuse me?"

"The mall parking lot. I have some friends there who're waiting for me…I think…"

"Uchiha Itachi and Sasuke, right?"

"Yeah," she said, shivering from the cold water.

"They haven't left since the beginning."

"O-oh. Can we go?"

He sighed. "If that is your wish."

And a couple minutes later, they were back there, Itachi's bright in the distance.

Sakura faltered out of the ambulance and made her way across the parking lot to where Sasuke was just standing up, Itachi behind him. Swallowing hard, Sakura went up to the younger Uchiha.

Her knees were shaking and she tried to hold her ground.

_Don't be weak. Don't be stupid. _

Sasuke's onyx eyes met hers. Itachi opened his mouth to speak but nothing came out.

(Not yet, anyway.)

Sakura was covered in blood, Kakashi's and her own, she was still soaking wet from the rice field. Her face was bruised, her leg was a mess.

"Sasuke," she started in a whisper.

"Hey," he said softly, taking a step toward her.

"I don't wanna get your shirt dirty, but…"

And just as her vision went blurry with tears, her knees buckled and she staggered forward, gently falling into his arms. Hoping he would hold her.

And he did.

Suddenly, Darkness engulfed her.

Sakura fainted.

A COUPLE DAYS LATER:

Sakura woke up in her room. Sunlight filled everything with gold. She was completely clean and in her pajamas. She had been waken up by soft guitar chords playing nearby.

She sat up in bed and saw Sasuke strumming lightly away at his midnight blue instrument by the door.

Before she could say anything, an orange cat hopped into her lap.

"Naruto!"

He meowed with delight as she petted his fur.

"I missed you, little guy."

Sasuke put down his guitar and made his way to them, sitting down on the corner of the bed.

"He did too. He was running around meowing in this shrill voice for 3 days."

She laughed: "I see."

"Listen, Sakura," Sasuke said, taking her hand, "I'm so sorry this happened. I can't believe you went through all that and—"

"Hey, it wasn't your fault," Sakura said, thrilled that he was holding her hand.

"Yeah, well…"

"MORNING!" Itachi shouted suddenly, bursting through the door.

"I feel violated," Sasuke muttered darkly.

Itachi laughed. "Seeing as how this is my house!"

"It's not yours," Sasuke said, letting go of her hand. "It's Dad's."

"And mine." The older Uchiha said.

Before Sasuke could say anything, Itachi pranced over to Sakura.

"HEY! How are you feeling?"

"Um, good—"

"Good! That's a lie, Sakura."

"Okay," she said, "so I'm a little sore, but, other than that—"

"Good morning Sakura!" Mikoto said, coming through the door, beaming.

She ran up to Sakura and hugged her.

"Thank God you're okay!" She said.

They all agreed.

This was followed by some interrogation and "oohs and ahhs" (mainly from Itachi).

A FEW DAYS LATER AT BREAKFAST:

Mikoto announced that in honor of Sakura's safe return and birthday, in a couple weeks, there would be a ball/dance that would be hosted in the massive ballroom.

A ball.

With lots of people and fancy clothes and music and dancing and food.

At night.

Excitement was in the air.

**A/N:** **Sakura's birthday is in March, but I'm going to change it to summer for just this story. Also, I'm changing the look of the ballroom, okay? Okay! Get ready for some Sasusaku! Review :D **


	20. Chapter 20

**A/N: Heys! Okay, just a note: If there are songs in the story anywhere, I suggest you listen to them. (I don't own any of the songs!) So Youtube them or something so you get the feel of the scene, okay? Okay!**

**Thanks to everyone!**

**Also, sadly…The end is near… the story is going to wrap up soon…(but this isn't the last chapter.) **

**Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto. **

The ballroom was a different section of the house, (a huge section.) It was raised above the ground, built on a hill next to the house, a little high up. The only way to enter from the outside was walking up a lighted walk or being dropped off in the semi circle in front of two large, elaborate doors.

Right now, the room was filled with people Mikoto had invited. Women and Men in fancy dresses, little kids running around, constant noise…

They stood around in threes and fours, drinking things and picking food off of plates carried by plates. There was a large, sleek black piano to one side, surrounded by chairs for the orchestra to sit in. (They weren't here yet.) Kakashi was coming with them, now fully healed. His violin had been fixed, a new bow bought, money had been given to him.

But he was late.

Anyway, two huge drink fountains had been set up, one with punch and the other had a milkshake flowing out of it.

(Sakura's request, of course.)

Snack tables lined the sides of the hall, and a couple circular ones were set up around the place, piled high with food. The glittering chandelier was shining brightly upon all.

To one side of the room, there was a balcony.

To enter the hall from inside the Uchiha house, you went through a hallways by the closet next to the front door, and proceeded to a door and up a velvet staircase. You kept going forward then down, into the ball room. Everyone could see you at the top and coming down. But at the summit, they'd fastened a curtain; so the persons in the question wouldn't be revealed unless they pushed apart the curtain and stepped out.

Behind this, currently, were all four Uchiha and Naruto. Sakura was coming soon.

"Okay," Mikoto said, "I don't think we can wait any longer. It's time!"

She gestured to the announcer at the bottom of the stairs. He cleared his throat into a microphone so that people were quiet.

"Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. The hosts of the party will now proceed into the hall. Now presenting Uchiha Mikoto!"

She stepped out of the curtain, beaming. Mikoto looked great as usual, in a light green silk gown that reached her ankles. Crystals shimmered in a detailed feather design across her dress, winding around her legs. White heels on her feet and white gloves on her arms. She climbed down the stairs, and after her came Fugaku. He was in a black tuxedo. When he reached the bottom of the stairs, Itachi pushed the curtain aside and came down the stairs in a dark plum colored suit. In the middle of the flight, there was a shrill, extremely angry _MEOW!_ And some human boy cursing.

People blinked rapidly and tilted heads in slight cautious curiosity.

Itachi grinned wildly as they heard scuffling sounds. He shook his head and skipped down to the floor, joining the party.

"Um, Mr. Sasuke," the announcer said to the curtain, "is there a problem? Or problems?"

There was another ticked off meow, and Naruto burst out of the curtain.

"That cat has problems!" Sasuke shouted, voice muffled from behind the curtain.

All eyes fell upon Naruto, who pranced down the velvet stair case. Around his neck was a black bow tie.

"Uh ," the announcer said, "presenting his…awesomeness, Naruto."

A few seconds later, the curtain parted again, and Sasuke stepped out.

People gasped and Mikoto face palmed.

He was wearing a black suit with a white shirt and a black tie, dark pants.

But.

His coat was unbuttoned, his shirt untucked and collar ruffled, tie loose. Claw marks on his arm, ripping clean through the cloth.

He shoved his hands into his pockets, scowling.

He probably was looking organized a couple seconds ago, but he wasn't now because a minute or two before, Mikoto had asked Sasuke (of all people. Why not Itachi?) to wrestle a _bow tie_-for heaven's sake-onto NARUTO.

It was for formality's sake, she put it simply.

As you can imagine, it didn't work out so well.

The mistake he made was smirking and lunging at the cat with the tie dangling threateningly from his fingers.

In the end though, Uchiha Sasuke managed. But anyway, his unkempt appearance made him look all the more dashing.

Girls swooned, Fugaku cursed, Itachi burst out laughing.

Naruto was waiting at the bottom of the stairs, hissing at Sasuke as he came down. Sasuke, in turn, was giving the cat a look that was pretty much equivalent to, _one of these days I'm going to skewer you alive._

He wasn't going to do that, of course, but it gave him satisfaction enough to see Naruto growl and disappear into the crowd.

(Plotting some sort of revenge, no doubt.)

Sasuke smirked to himself and stepped into the people, finding his friends.

After seeing someone behind the curtain, the announcer drew back, coughed into the microphone and said: "Now presenting the birthday girl, Haruno Sakura!"

And she came out.

There was a collective gasp.

Sakura was wearing a black dress with tiny pink diamonds sewn together to create a large lotus rising up to her waist. It's stem was made up of jade stones, and at its base more jade was placed to suggest grass. A crystal lily grew there as well. Shiny red string sewn tightly together indicated rose petals falling from an invisible bush. Though the dress was black, it faded to the darkest, deepest purple a her chest, sparkling with amethyst here and there. The collar, (instead of going around her neck) went around her shoulders, trimmed with silver. The sleeves were tight up to her elbows, where there was a silver band, after which, they loosened out, transparent, then ended after a couple inches.

The dress hugged her waist, where there was a large silver ribbon tied to a bow at her back. From there, the cloth flowed outward and down. The bottom of it (also laced with silver) reached her feet. Upon her feet were black ballet flats.

Her pink hair was down, except for a small portion of it which was separated into two parts (on either side of her head) and braided back with jasmine flowers. On the back of her head, a silver peacock clasp encrusted with pearls held the two braids together. She was wearing a little make up, just some lip gloss.

She didn't need blush.

The natural one was drenching her pale cheeks in scarlet. No one but Mikoto had seen her in this dress, so it was hard enough to have scores of people staring at her, while she tried not to trip over her own feet. It was bad enough, as well, to have to walk down a staircase with people staring at you, but even worse when you know _Uchiha Sasuke _is watching you from the bottom.

A good type of worse.

The announcer pulled the microphone to his mouth and said: "The dancing will begin just as soon as the orchestra gets here."

Sakura got to the end of the stair case, and after people stared at her some more, they went back to their conversations.

Before she could do anything, some woman hugged her. Sakura blinked.

"Happy Birthday, Sakura!" the lady smiled.

"Thanks!" Sakura chirped in an uncharacteristically chirpy voice. The dress, the night, the people…it was kind of exhilarating.

"I need to give you your gift now, can't just leave her on the gift table…"

"Her?"

The woman pulled a carrying case from behind her, "I already talked to Mikoto, and she said it was fine if I gave you…"

She opened the case, and a cat with midnight blue fur and lavender eyes hopped into Sakura's arms.

"Her name is Hinata," the woman said.

Around the cat's neck was a large, white silk ribbon, tied to a bow on the right side.

Sakura ran a hand through her soft, dark fur. Hinata meowed shyly.

"Oh, she's adorable,"

"Yes, I know!"

"Truth is," the rosette said, "we already have a cat. Naruto."

"Oh," the woman said hurriedly, "I can take her back if—"

"No, it's okay!" Sakura grinned, "I'm sure they'll get along just fine. I'll go find Naruto."

She started turning away, then jerked back.

"Thank you Ma'm! I'll take good care of her!"

"You're very welcome, dear! Happy sixteenth!"

Sakura weaved through the crowds, dodging people, ducking under arms. She looked around for Naruto.

Sakura, as you know, did not get to see Sasuke yet, she didn't see his disheveled appearance, and she didn't know that Naruto was underneath a table conspirating with Akamaru. The dog, of course, had nothing against Sasuke, but hey, why not?

Kiba was here as well, Sakura didn't know where, but here.

From the day she was kidnapped to this night, things had happened. Pain, Deidara, Anko, and Jiraiya had been arrested. The orange car they left on the road so long ago had been refilled and returned, Fugaku was completely better, so was Kakashi, and now Sakura had turned sixteen years old. Her purple corduroy bag was back in her room, along with the emerald star necklace, and the sparkly Saturn had washed off of her arm.

Something caught her eye.

A white tail wagging out of a long white table cloth. Sakura smiled, then bent down and lifted the cloth up, revealing cat and dog. Naruto meowed and rubbed himself against Sakura's leg.

"Hey you guys," she said, "I have to introduce someone," She placed Hinata on the floor, "she's Hinata. Be nice to her, okay?"

The cat meowed nervously.

Naruto and Akamaru jumped out from under the table. The orange-furred blinked his big blue eyes at Hinata, then circled around her. Akamaru sniffed her, then sat down. Naruto started playing with her tail, and when she started nervously flicking it away, he quit. He went up to her and rubbed his cheek against hers.

If cats could blush, Hinata was beet red.

She gave a slightly terrified and shy meow, then raced away.

Naruto raced after.

Akamaru followed.

Sakura sat there, laughing to herself, when someone grabbed her arm. She whirled around to see Itachi grinning at her.

"Hey Sakura!"

"Hi Itachi—"

"You look so cool! And now you have to dance! Kakashi's here, along with the orchestra! We're gonna play that one song you requested, okay? And I'm on piano! Come on!"

Before Sakura could speak, Itachi pulled her over to the floor, with the piano on the side. Kakashi and some string players were just sitting down. "Excuse me, ladies and gentlemen!" Itachi shouted into a microphone. "It's time for the birthday girl to dance!"

There was a cheer.

"Please clear this floor, form a circle or something…"

They did. The people in the hall made a misshapen looking oval with a large, clear place to dance in the middle.

"Sakura get's to pick her partner!" was the last thing he said, before Mikoto swiped the microphone out of his hand.

"Okay, Sakura!" Mikoto said, telling Itachi to GO TO HIS PIANO, "who will it be?"

All eyes were on her.

Mikoto put the mic. by Sakura's mouth.

Sakura felt sweat on her forehead, felt her cheeks go red again.

Well…there was really only one person…close to her height, her age, someone she'd known since the beginning, really the only kid here (besides Kiba) that she knew. She knew it was predictable, she knew he probably didn't want to dance, but…

"Um, Sasuke?"

The crowds parted, and eyes flew to Uchiha Sasuke, standing there with his hands in his pockets and a lazy smirk on his face.

She walked slowly towards him.

"Uh…May I…may I have this dance?"

He would have given it to her anyway.

"Certainly."

Relief flowed through her as he took her outstretched hand, after bowing. She was kind of surprised to see him looking so…frazzled, but Sakura didn't mind. She thought it suited him.

They walked to the center of the oval, Sakura's hand on his shoulder, his right hand on her waist, right above the knot of the ribbon. He pulled her towards him as the lights dimmed and the chandelier shone on only them.

Sakura took a deep breath.

Sasuke's onyx eyes were trained on her face.

She vaguely heard Kakashi mutter, "one, two, three."

And he started to play "Hiroki's Melody" composed by Tenmon. It was from the soundtrack of the movie "The Place Promised In Our Early Days."

Sasuke and Sakura could both dance well, their parents were big dancers.

They saw to it.

As the violin notes rang out, Sakura and Sasuke moved gently to the music, slowly stepping across the floor. Gentle sounds filled the air…

She wanted to say something, but didn't know what to say. Sure, her back was warm where his hand was, heat went up her spine, but she found she could not speak.

She was so close to him.

Sakura closed her eyes as Itachi and the rest of the orchestra came in with the piano and the other strings. Momentum from the song filled the entire room, it seemed no one dared to breath.

Faraway, the train sounded it's horn.

Then, utter silence, save for the music.

"I wish…this would last forever…"

And then it ended. Just like that.

The lights came back on and people clapped.

Sakura and Sasuke stepped away from each other, bowed and curtsied. Kakashi, Itachi, and the orchestra bowed as well, soaking up the applause.

After this, everyone ate a glorious dinner, consisting of warm soup and rolls, rice and fish, pizza, pudding, drinks and desert. After that, a waiter wheeled in the cake. A huge, chocolate cake with ice cream inside. There were candles and there was frosting and it was so cool looking.

Sakura gripped the knife as she cut through the soft cake. "Happy Birthday, Sakura!" was written on it surrounded by roses. Itachi, Sasuke Fugaku and Mikoto were next to her as applause filled the air.

An Image of her fifteenth birthday cake floated into her mind. Her mom's crooked green frosting handwriting…the sad excuses of flowers…the slightly slumping cubical shape of it…Sakura felt her hand slacking against the handle of the knife. Mikoto reached out and closed her hand over Sakura's, cutting firmly into the cake.

She smiled warmly at Sakura, letting her know things were going to be okay.

Sakura returned a slightly broken smile, and ate the piece of cake she cut. People sang happy birthday, but Sakura didn't really hear it.

The crowds got up from the tables as Kakashi and the orchestra began another song. It was music that one would waltz to, and so people did. Couples put down their glasses and took their poses with each other.

Sweet music played, people danced, people talked…

Sasuke took Sakura to introduce her to his friends.

They were sitting around a circular table by one of the huge drink fountains.

Sasuke led her to it.

"Guys," he told them, "Sakura." He pointed to her. "Sakura, this is Neji."

Neji greeted her with a nod and half smile.

"Shikamaru…"

A boy with spiky brown hair waved.

"And that's—"

"Hey. It's Temari," a girl said, She had spiky blonde hair set back in four pony-tails. She was waving a fan at herself. Temari was wearing a sky blue feathery dress that reached the middle of her shins. It was strapless, with sequins at the top. She wore a bronze bracelet around her for arm, with earrings that matched.

"Hi Sakura!" another girl said, shaking the rosettes hand. "I'm Tenten."

Tenten had brown hair and chocolate brown eyes. She was wearing a silky red and black dress that went right above her knees. She was wearing long black gloves and black leggings under her dress. Her hair was up in two buns.

"Hey you guys," Sakura said, noting how boring she sounded.

"I'll be right back," Sasuke said, and strode away into the crowds.

Sakura sat down with the girls. _Thanks for leaving me with total strangers, Sasuke._

Suddenly, Hinata, Naruto and Akamaru ran up to them, panting. They ran around the table. Again and again.

Temari leaned back and crossed her legs as Tenten sat up on the table. Neji and Shikamaru said nothing, just watched the cats and dog race around.

Then Temari picked up a cherry from a plate on the table.

"So, what did it feel like to be kidnapped?" Tenten asked Sakura.

"Uh, bad. Really terrifying."

"But you got away," Temari said, popping the fruit into her mouth.

"Yeah, how'd you get away?" Shikamaru asked.

"Kakashi rescued me, actually," Sakura said.

"Ah."

"What did it feel like to be rescued?"

"Good."

Temari spit out the pit then put the stem into her mouth.

"What are you doing, Temari?" Tenten asked.

Temari's face scrunched up as her lips twisted around awkwardly. After a moment, she said, "got it!" and pulled the stem from out of her mouth.

It was tied.

"It means you're a good kisser," Temari said, twirling it around, "if you can tie a cherry stem around itself."

"Come on, that can't be real," Tenten said, grabbing a cherry, "but I'll try it." Sakura and Shikamaru got cherries as well, out of curiosity.

Neji plainly refused to engage in such disrespectable behavior.

Sakura put the stem in her mouth. It was harder than it looked, tying it with your tongue. She couldn't even get it to bend.

Tenten cried out as she achieved success.

"I did it."

Temari shot her a bored thumbs up.

Shikamaru spat it out, giving up. "Screw this," he muttered darkly. "Come on Temari—"

"Please don't ask me to dance."

"Too late," he whispered, grabbing her hands and pulling her up. They disappeared onto the dance floor.

Sakura tried the stem again. It just wouldn't work.

Tenten and Neji started making conversation, and Sakura decided to take her leave.

The animals raced away as well, towards a fountain.

"I think I need some air," she said, and stood up making her way to the balcony. If was the only place where no one was, and cool night air blew in her face. The moon was out, a full, beautiful moon. Stars were scattered around it, not as many as the first night she was on the roof. Sakura pulled the cherry stem out of her mouth and threw it off the balcony.

She sighed and leaned against it, chin in arms, discouraged.

The bell tower ran, far away.

And she heard footsteps behind her.

Sasuke came and stood next to Sakura.

"Hey."

"Hi."

Awkward silence.

"Guess who's a bad kisser?" she blurted.

He arched an eyebrow.

"Uh, forget I said that," she flushed and looked at the sky.

Sweet music drifted in from the hall.

Sasuke smirked and already suspected she tried the cherry stem thing.

Then he decided now would be a good time to…

"So," Sasuke started. "Happy Sixteenth."

"..Thanks."

"Yeah. Um. When…we were waiting for you, back in the mall parking lot, Itachi told me…"

Fear flooded Sakura.

"How you…er. How you like me."

He didn't mean for it to come out quite like that.

She looked so terrified, he was musing to himself that she didn't have to be, because…

His onyx eyes met her emerald ones, and she noticed a slight hint of amusement there.

She almost started crying.

"Yeah, wow. This is embarrassing. I know you don't think of me like that, I'll just," she turned away, fighting not to sob, when he grabbed her by the knot of the ribbon on her back.

"Hang on," he whispered, "I didn't say anything about…"

He turned her around slowly.

"what I think."

A second later:

His eyes reflected moonlight as he smirked and leaned in, softly pressing his lips to hers.

Sakura's emerald orbs widened as she felt his mouth on hers. Her face burned.

First kiss.

(Sasuke was obviously the experienced one in this department.) Her heart skipped a beat, and she felt her knees go weak, a thrilling, nervous feeling rising in her, sweet and hot.

A cool breeze blew.

Her eyes closed, head leaning to the left. It felt so good...The moon on her eyelids, music in her ears, Sasuke so close…closer than ever…

_Is he really…actually…are we…is this…what I think it is? _

And even though she didn't want it to, one tear slid down her face, the saltwater coming between their lips.

Sasuke pulled away, slightly.

His hand went up, and he brushed his fingers across her cheek, wiping the tear away.

"But now I have."

His other hand fell down from her back.

Sakura, completely dazed, swayed then stood straight. First kiss…

"Sasuke, I'm sorry I—"

"Don't be sorry," he pushed his hands into his pockets, and started walking away, "besides," he said over his shoulder, "you weren't that bad at it anyway."

He went back into the hall, not looking back.

Sakura's mouth opened, then closed.

She brought a finger to her slightly stung lips and felt herself grin like an idiot, turning back to the fields on the horizon.

First kiss from Uchiha Sasuke.

It was wonderful.

Hiding behind a chair by the balcony, Itachi smiled to himself, giddy.

_It was about time. _

**A/N: How was that end scene? That was probably one of the first completed kiss scenes I've actually written. Did you like it? LET ME KNOW! It was kind of rushed, yes I know…but anyway. Also, the cherry stem thing, I don't know who's idea that is, but I don't own that idea. I'm not sure if it works either.**

**And in case you're wondering, I can't do it.**

**XD. **

**Review's would be great. :)**


	21. Chapter 21

**Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto. **

Sakura moved away.

Tsunade came for her the day after the rosette accidently cut her finger while helping Mikoto chop onions. She wasn't supposed to be slicing onions, of course, but she'd volunteered and was quite persistent.

The wound was deep, but thankfully, she was okay.

Lady Tsunade didn't believe so. She blamed Mikoto and said "the environment is not a safe one. Time to find Sakura a new home."

She was already suspicious and weary since the whole kidnapping thing. There wasn't time for anything. Sakura just had to pack her bags and go. Goodbyes took place at the front door, sad and angry.

Things between her and Sasuke were wonderful, and it was all too soon put to an end.

The last glimpse she saw of them was through tears, locked in her mind forever.

She was moved to another city; a really busy one. No stars were visible at night. The first days she cried, but the daughter of the house, Ino, was always there to comfort her.

There were no other siblings except for her. Sakura spent her days doing whatever Ino was doing, learning to drive, getting her license. Getting a part-time job. Surrounded by the noise and clamor of the city, she lived.

Time flew, and months dwindled away…

EIGHT YEARS LATER.

Haruno Sakura jerked awake, panting. That dream again. The one where she was reliving the car crash, only this time, Jiraiya floated in from the windshield and stabbed Sakura, so she was dead too. As soon as the knife touched her skin, she woke. Every time.

She stared around, searching wildly for the light. The rosette took a deep breath and calmed herself down as she clicked on the lamp at her side. Dim light filled the apartment. She looked to the right side of the bed; he wasn't there. Her husband was still at work.

The steady patter of rain sounded outside.

Sakura sat up and reached for her cell phone on the night table. 3 AM. She looked to the calendar on a wall to her left, taped on with hurried fingers. Her emerald eyes found today's date, around the box was a circle.

She gripped the phone she'd had for ages.

It was his birthday. Twenty four this year.

_Now. Maybe I should call now. _

She wouldn't get another chance today. She never called on his birthday, it always slipped past her. And something odd in the air made her want to do it.

Some sort of…longing. Almost.

Sakura stood and made her way to the tiny closet, leaning over and reaching into the back and pulling out a letter. She'd gotten it from Uchiha Sasuke a year ago. She unfolded it with trembling fingers and didn't bother to read it. Too painful.

He'd explained what had happened, Fugaku had passed away, and Mikoto had gone to live with Itachi and his wife and three children. She couldn't stand being all alone in the huge house without her love. Sasuke was married, and he and his wife were currently living in the Uchiha house. It was brief. Sakura never had the guts to write back. The emerald star necklace was also enclosed inside of it, she'd left it in her closet all those years ago. It was around her neck, right now. Sasuke had also written the phone numbers of himself and Itachi in the post note.

Sakura would call Itachi every once in a while, her brother. He was how he always was. Excited and goofy. Naruto and Hinata and their kittens lived in his house.

The pink-haired ran her finger along the paper, and before she had second thoughts, Sakura dialed Sasuke's cell phone number. She put the letter back and shut the door as it started to ring. She went past the dresser, upon which sat the now dusty and old glass prism with cherry blossoms inside.

Sakura stepped out of the small apartment and onto the balcony, sliding open the clear doors. It was raining, pouring. Just the way she liked it. Sakura rubbed the sleep out of her eyes.

The phone rang.

No answer, just a long BEEP.

She tried again.

After a few rings, a young woman's groggy voice sounded: "Listen, buddy. It's the middle of the night. This had better be good."

"Uh. Is…is…sorry. I think I have the wrong number."

"That's very possible."

The woman hung up before the rosette could say a word. _Coward! Chicken! You didn't even ask for him! _Actually, she wasn't even sure why this lady picked up Sasuke's cell phone.

Sakura bit her lip and dialed the number once more. The city was so busy. The clouds were a dark shade of red. Rain slid off of honking cars and neon lights. She rubbed her bare shoulders as wind ruffled her night gown.

On the other end, there was a groan.

"You again."

"Um, yeah. Can you, uh, is…Uchiha Sasuke there?"

"Who is this?"

"Er-Haruno Sakura."

A pause, then a muffled, "here, hun. Wake up. It's for you."

A moment later, he spoke.

"Hello?"

His voice still made her heart race. _But you shouldn't have feelings like that when you're married to someone else,_ A voice in her mind said.

She swallowed.

"Um. Hi. It's me."

Sasuke sat up in bed, the voice awakening him completely.

"Sakura."

"Yeah. Hey. How are you?"

"…Fine. You?"

"Good. Happy birthday."

"Thanks."

Silence. Rain fell.

"So um…That lady who picked up the phone," she swallowed, "you're wife?"

"Yeah…what about you?" he asked flatly. "Married yet?"

"Yes. I am."

Longer silence. If Naruto was near, he would have been snickering.

Apparently they both thought of the same certain feline, because Sasuke broke the quiet.

"So how's everything?" He heard how dull he sounded, and he knew he was never one to make pointless small talk, but…that cat…

Sakura laughed. "How it's always been. Good."

Sasuke was quiet. Then:

"You should know by now I know when you're lying."

Sakura felt like caving in. Her stomach heaved, and her head sank down into her arms, on the balcony railing. A few minutes later:

"Sasuke," she whispered, spilling, closing her eyes. The dark, lonely nights, empty days and wasted minutes. The pain, tears, and shouted words… "I didn't know… I thought it was love. I-I didn't think it would be like this."

Before Sasuke could say anything, the cell phone was slapped out of Sakura's hand and a fist slammed into her cheek.

Pain burst.

"Who were you talking to?" her husband snapped. He must've come in just now, quietly.

"A friend!" Sakura said fiercely, clenching her fists and whirling around to face him.

"The kind of friend you call in the middle of the night?"

No answer.

He grabbed her wrist and yanked her to him.

"You _thought_ it was love? You didn't think it would be like this?"

Sakura bit her lip and felt the tears come to her eyes.

"That's right! I thought it was, but I knew it wasn't! I know what love feels like, and I didn't feel it with you." She regretted saying that last part as soon as his fist slammed into her middle.

She collapsed to the floor.

"Say that to my face, you cheating pig."

"It was-" Sakura gasped as tears fell to the concrete beneath her, "a long time ago!"

She hated for this to happen with Sasuke listening. She sounded so pitiful and weak.

Her husband laughed, long and hard, as she slowly faltered to her feet.

"I don't care about _love!_" he hissed, "and I don't care about you. All I want is that money _our _descendants are going to get." He clamped a hand over his mouth. Oops. 

Sakura froze and her breath came fast.

"All this time…that's it. That's all you wanted." She shook her head and chuckled bitterly, a hand reaching up to her fore head. "And I actually thought…you…"

_I'm such a fool. _

"That's it. I'm leaving."

"You'll just come crawling back," he said, grinning harshly, "You're a lost, weak little orphan girl with nowhere to go."

Sakura grabbed her phone and walked past him. She slipped into her sneakers and turned to glare.

"Maybe I do have a place to go."

His grin changed to a snarl and he stepped forward, snatching her arm. "I am going to hit you so hard…"

"I'm divorcing you," her voice wavered slightly, "Goodbye."

"You're not going anywhere," he snarled, jerking her towards him.

Sakura recalled something Itachi had shown her long ago. Without any thought, she reached up and punched his neck. For a few seconds, he couldn't breathe.

A few seconds was enough.

Sakura spun around and ran down the hallway, sobbing.

She raced down the steps in her sneakers and a night gown. On the other end, Sasuke's mouth was dry.

"Don't tell me you're married to that guy. And he just…"

He heard her quick, ragged breaths on the other end.

Sakura threw open the door to the apartment building and ran out into the city. Cars honked and lights flashed. The rain immediately seeped through her gown, soaking her to the bone. She'd left everything back there. Money, clothes, food…

"He beats you." Sasuke was not asking a question. It was a statement, a flat, angry declarative sentence.

She was silent.

He cursed and stood. Throwing on some clothes, Sasuke grabbed his coat. He was still young, his styled hadn't changed.

"My God, Sakura— why didn't you leave him the second he hurt you?"

Running, Sakura panted as rain washed over her. She let herself cry while she spoke, sounding pitiful, she knew.

"Where was I supposed to go?"

Ino's parents had passed away, she'd moved across the country after it. Sakura had no car. She'd been working a part time job at the library, but it wasn't enough to buy one. She didn't know this city; it was too unfamiliar.

Sasuke turned around to his wife as Sakura slid down wet wall, gathering deep lungfuls of air.

The new Uchiha was sitting up in bed.

"Do you wanna come?"

"To where?" She asked.

"I don't know yet."

"Why do you have to go?"

"Someone needs me."

"She needs you now, in the middle of the night."

A nod.

"Can't this wait 'till tomorrow?" she groaned.

"Sorry, no," Sasuke said quietly, "See, I made a promise. A long time ago."

His wife sighed and stood, "All right, I'm with you." She made her way to the walk- in closet and plucked up a skirt and sweater. She threw them on and followed Sasuke out the door.

"Sakura."

He waited until her breathing no longer came in ragged, shuttering, sobs. He'd seen her cry before, but never like this.

"Sakura, where are you? I'm coming." They sat in his sleek black car.

"…You're coming to get me?"

"Duh I'm coming to get you. Not just gonna leave you out in the middle of the night alone."

Sakura smiled through her tears, telling him where she was, what city, what street.

"It's about an hour and a half from here," Sasuke said, driving through Konoha and out into the fields. The highway stretched out before him, "Just wait, okay? I'll see you—"

"Don't, please," she whispered, running again, "don't leave me. Don't hang up."

A sigh.

"All right."

Sakura craned her neck to see in front of her. She hoped he ran past when she was hiding behind that wall. She slowed down, looking behind her. Wind blew. Sakura shivered, scattering rain drops. She was so cold. She'd never been this cold in her life. The rosette ducked down under a small roof in front of a closed store. It was on the corner, so she was hidden. She pulled her knees to her chest and heard her teeth chatter. Cold wind blew thru her.

Later…

It took a while, but they found her.

Huddled under an aluminum roof like a wet flower, Sakura was there. Sasuke pushed open his door and stood, getting out of the car. He approached her. She'd changed a little. Taller. She was shivering, freezing, in a night gown and shoes.

"Sakura."

She lifted her head, her wet face. A blur of movement, and his coat was around her shoulders, dropped down from above.

She staggered to her feet, shivering. Rain was still falling.

Her wide emerald eyes met his onyx orbs.

And her lips parted, she spoke his name, barely audible.

"Hey," he said softly, repeating the word and the stance from so long ago, when she'd met them in the mall parking lot.

Before she could think, Sakura reached up embraced him. He was warm, compared to her. The soothing feel of familiar touch spread through her.

But he stiffened.

Sasuke knew his Uchiha ways, when to act, when to love, when to care, when to be still. Now, though, he was immobile. He didn't know what to do. She needed someone, and he'd promised her that, but he was married—what was his wife thinking, watching from the car?—and, well…

Sakura froze, realization flooding her: she blinked rapidly and released him.

She took a couple quick steps back.

"Sorry," she said.

"It's…don't worry about it. Come on."

She followed him through the rain and to a car parallel parked on the road. Inside of it, a young woman sat, ashen faced, in the passenger seat. She sat down in the back seat, getting everything wet and dirty. Sasuke was wet as well, but not nearly as much as her.

He introduced her to his wife as they drove out of the city and to the high way. She seemed nice enough, determined and strong like Sasuke. They were an…an okay match, she decided. But couldn't help but feel…a small jab of pain…

She ran her hand over the seat, trying to distract herself.

Sakura smiled slightly, leaning her head on the door.

"This is the same car…" she whispered, "I'm glad you can drive it without…running into…a… what was it?…a cat…"

"Squirrel."

And by the time Sasuke could smirk and flick his eyes at her in the rear view mirror, she was asleep.

They rode alongside the train, until it grew faster and blew it's horn. The same train.

Someone was shaking her shoulder.

She looked up into the face of Sasuke's wife.

"Let's go, Sakura," she was saying, "we're here."

When Sakura looked into the sky, she was thrilled to see the bright stars above her.

They made their way back inside, old memories filled the rosette.

Sakura kicked off her wet shoes by the closet.

She'd kicked off her wet sneakers here the first time she entered. She'd also drooled on Sasuke's shoulder right here, it was where Itachi'd freaked her out into falling—

They went upstairs, Sakura's hand running over the couch in the bonus room. Nothing had changed at all.

"You can sleep in your room," Sasuke said.

Sakura nodded. It was still her room. Hers.

"And, uh," he looked at his wife, "could you give her some of your clothes until we can get…?"

"Sure."

"Wait," Sakura said, "thanks."

"Anytime."

"And for this…" she held out his soggy coat.

He smirked and took it from her.

They walked down the hallway by Sasuke's old room and into the master bedroom.

Sakura swallowed hard and turned back to her own room. She pushed the door open. It was the same. Purple and green walls, white sheets, dresser, desk, closet…

So familiar.

The only things missing were Naruto and Hinata, plus all her stuff.

Sakura opened the glass door and stepped out onto the balcony. Pitch black, the city to her left, hills and fields, stars in the sky…

She sighed.

A few minutes later, the newest addition to the Uchiha family came in and gave Sakura some clothes. Some p.j's and a couple pants and shirts.

And soon, Sakura was asleep.

The next morning, at breakfast—

"So," Sasuke said to Sakura who was sitting across from him, "what now?"

Sakura played with her cereal. She was sitting in her spot, the place she always sat. Usually, Sasuke would sit next to her but his wife was on the other side, so…

"Where do you want to go?"

They both knew she had nowhere to go.

No answer.

At his side, his wife sipped coffee.

"You can stay here, if you want," she said.

"I…I don't want to be a burden to you guys, really."

"You were never a burden," Sasuke said, putting his plate in the sink, "not to mom and dad, Itachi, or us. You can stay."

Silence.

"Thank you. I promise I'll work extra hard and make it up to you—"

His lower lip fell down slightly.

_That freak of a husband really messed her up. _

"It's your house, too, Sakura. You don't have to make it up. We all work a little."

"Oh."

He cast her one last glance, and set off to work in his sleek black car.

Awkward conversation started between Sakura and Mrs. Uchiha.

"That's a…pretty ring," Sakura said, gesturing to one on her finger.

"Oh, thanks!" Sasuke's wife trilled, "engagement ring. He said it reminded him of some kind of flower. I don't see it, but it's beautiful, I know."

Sakura looked at is, closer this time. It was silver, with layered white diamonds in the center, reaching out from the middle, tiny pink crystal was carved into two feathers on the right and left. They kind of looked like petals. And if you added a couple more…the...cherry blossom…

"Sakura? You okay?"

"Uh, yeah. I'm fine."

Sakura sent the divorce notice later, and asked some of the servants if they could go back to the apartment and get her stuff.

They did, bringing all her old belongings. She set all of it up in her room like how it used to be. Like home.

LATER THAT NIGHT:

Sakura walked down the hallway by the closet and up the velvet staircase. Her bare feet made their way down it, on the other side. It was dark, so Sakura flicked the switch on for the chandelier. The massive ball room stretched out before her. The clear black sky was visible through the ceiling. The cool wooden floor underneath her was still polished and shining. The piano in the corner…tables, fountains…the things had been rearranged but still there.

Sakura walked to the center of the room, the place where she had gripped the hand of her love, surrounded by unfamiliar faces. The place where she felt, for once…at…at ease. She couldn't remember how they danced, but she knew the music, and began humming to herself as she twirled and spun with an invisible partner.

The rosette made her way to the balcony on the side. She pushed open the doors and stepped out into the darkness. Leaning on the railing, she sighed. Looking up into the sky, she saw a tiny sliver of moon.

To think…it was a night like this one…so long ago…

She closed her eyes. She was back here. After all those years, after the horrid moments in that apartment. She'd gone and messed up her life. All anybody was after was the money her children would get. Except for…of course…a couple people in her life…

In the end, she cursed and told herself she'd never get married and have kids.

She stayed like that for a long time, forcing herself not to cry. It didn't work.

A sound behind her.

She whirled around to see Sasuke with his hands in his pockets, behind him, his wife.

When he saw that her face was tear-streaked, he looked softly away while his wife stared.

"Why are you crying?" she asked, hurrying forward.

"It's nothing," Sakura said, practically reliving the moment when Sasuke'd wiped that tear away. He'd said he'd be here to do it, but he was married… she did it herself this time.

"Probably reminiscing," he said, walking to the railing and leaning his back on it.

He could read her like a book.

She smiled and sighed, turning her emerald eyes to the sky.

Mrs. Uchiha came and stood between them.

She looked from one to another.

Wind blew.

"You guys still haven't told me how you're related."

"Sister. Foster sister."

"He's my brother…"

They looked at each other, sidelong; moonlight reflecting on their faces.

The train sounded its horn, rushing by to the right.

"but…so much more," she whispered.

Sasuke gave her an actual smile; he knew what she was thinking.

Uchiha Sasuke and Haruno Sakura.

They'd shared a house, feelings, food, money, parents, a promise, a dance, a kiss…

They'd shared love.

Although they couldn't keep it going on now, it had happened.

They'd felt it. They'd lived it.

No matter how they parted ways, no matter how far or near…that feeling…that beautiful warmth from the other…that would stay with both of them forever.

And really though, that wasn't so bad.

_The End_.

**A/N: Thus completes my first fan fiction. I want to say thank you sooooo much to ALL the readers and reviewers one last time. I couldn't have come this far without all the support! Seriously, you guys have no idea. I really appreciate it. lol, when I started this story, I had no idea how it would turn out. I can't believe I actually finished it. And I can't believe school is starting soon. Anyway…so…yeah. How was this chapter? I hope the ending was satisfying. I know Sasuke's wife and Sakura's husband are never named, and that's only because I couldn't think of any names, and I wanted them to remain unknown. I needed to make the point that Sasuke still cares for Sakura, but he's married, and he wants to be faithful, and…you know? And Sakura still loves him, but she can't let herself get between their marriage and tries to accept it. I wanted to tie up all the loose ends and complete it with a suitable closing, too. I think I rushed it. Sorry for such a late update, I just didn't know how to finish this story! Yeah. *watery smile* Okay. So. Um. Yeah. Please review. Bye. **


	22. Chapter 22

**A/N: HELLO! Yes. So. Um. I'm back. It's been, what, four months? All right. So, for all the people who hated the ending of 21, don't worry. It's not the end. I know, look, not everyone gets the happily ever after, not everyone lives a perfect life with the one they love. I wanted to show that side a little. And there are those of you out there who are thinking, 'Come on! It was a story! We read stories to escape the harsh truth! You didn't have to include the sad reality.' Okay. I get it. I'm sorry. So now, I present: Chapter 22! Er, it's more like the epilogue. I guess. Because chapter 21 ended on such a sad note, I'm going to add this after party! So, imagine that all the characters were just acting in the story like you would in a play. A lot like the Fullmetal Alchemist OVA "Chibi Character After Party" that comes after the movie. Everyone still has the same names, and the people who are related to each other in the story are related to each other in the after party. Okay? 'Kay!**

**Yeah, well…let me know if I've changed over…well…since SCHOOL started. It's winter break now, though! YES! **

**(And actually, I really, really missed typing this disclaimer!)**

**DISCLAIMER: I do NOT own Naruto or any of the characters from it! I don't own the whole "character after party" idea, only what happens during it. I don't own any of the songs! **

**Ahh. That felt good. **

**And thank you very much for the reviews! **

**Anyway. Let the show begin…**

Masses of police officers and mobs of people and extras filed towards a restaurant after a long, harrowing process of being in a story called "When Sakura Moved In."

"Dumb author," someone muttered. "She doesn't give us enough screen time!"

"It's the lead roles who get all the attention."

"Part time workers deserve more respect!"

Inuzuka Kiba glumly tromped/led the people towards the restaurant where the after party was being held. All that time and effort. First, she wanted him in the text. Then she forgot about him. And then she wanted him back for the 19th chapter. Gmmm…he rubbed his eyes. Sleepless nights had followed. That's all he had to do. A couple lines, huh? "Did you see my dog." "You need a medic." Days had been spent on them, rearranging things and deciding to keep Kiba in. He was one of those "in betweens." Kind of important, but kind of not.

His little dog, who was actually his dog in real life, came bounding after him. Kiba scooped Akamaru up and stepped into the restaurant. Well, tried, at least.

The door shut in his face. A click. Groans of protest and shouts of anger sounded immediately.

And, just for fun, Miss Author decided it would start raining.

Nice and hot on an already hot day. Agitated and wet, the crowd was easily angered.

In the door, Uchiha Itachi slid open a tiny piece of wood, he peered through the slit. It revealed his eyes only. They were bright and happy. 

"Who's the-e-e-e-e-re?" He asked in an obnoxious sing-song tone. This one. This one Kiba hated the most, besides Uchiha Sasuke and Hyuuga neji.

The rain soaked through his clothes. Things that were worn back stage when he wasn't in the text quite yet. Water dripped off his hair as his teeth clenched together.

"Us," he answered evenly.

"Whats the Pa-s-s-s-s-w-o-o-o-ord?"

Kiba answered with a single cuss.

"That's not it," Itachi piped, but even so, swung the large wooden thing open.

Everyone tumbled inside.

Apparently, they'd been interrupting something: Most of the lead characters were already here. All of them weren't leads, but then again, friends of the leads also got in, right?

Which was kind of unfair.

Uchiha Sasuke sat across a table from Haruno Sakura. Next to them were two other people, and Naruto and Hinata and their kittens were running around. Nara Shikamaru was leaning against a wall with wheat grass in his mouth, Temari fanning herself next to him. But Kiba didn't notice them.

His eyes flew immediately to the pair farthest down their table. Actually, his eyes flew to her.

Tenten blinked as Kiba burst through the door, then Neji's hand tightened around hers.

He winced.

It annoyed him enough to see her with him, but it's not like he could just start crying and walkout.

**More People piled into the room, so Kiba and Akamaru went further in. Itachi took a couple steps back, then just laughed, shrugged, and sat himself down at a table. **

**They rang out their wet clothes. And Kiba noticed, looking up under his damp mahogany bangs, that Tenten had now turned her attention back to Neji, a complete, admiring look on her face, radiating love and affection. **

**He hated that guy some more. **

**Painful heat sliced his cheeks and he tore his eyes away. Infuriating. Kiba plopped down into an empty chair at an empty table in the corner, not seeing, or near enough to see them. Akamaru's ears drooped, sharing his brother's emotions. Kiba lifted a hand and rubbed his soft white head. Sending him an encouraging, slightly broken smile.**

**A waitress was walking by, and she kindly asked if he'd like anything. Everything was free today! she'd said.**

**He ordered a cup of steaming hot chocolate and warm rolls. Some lamb curry soup for himself and Akamaru (one of their favorites). He cupped his face with his left palm, elbow on the table. After the waitress had gone, his thoughts flicked back to Tenten. _I don't care. I don't care who she's with. _Then he just ended up moaning. Those reassuring thoughts weren't in the least bit reassuring because he did indeed care who she was with. **

**Very much so. **

**The waitress came back a few minutes later, laying down the food in front of him. He nodded thanks. Akamaru dug into his meal with slow vigor. Kiba turned the cup of hot chocolate so the handle was facing him. A thought struck him, from a wise, low voice in the back of his head. Kiba's fingers clenched the cool metal arch, then after a moment, his grip slackened, grew loose, and, in the end, he let go. A sigh escaped his lips. It was right. No matter how much he hated it, the words were right again. _If you truly love someone, you'll want them to be happy…Even if it's not…with…you. _**

**Truth was, Uzumaki Naruto was an actually real character. He was eighteen years old, all spiky blonde hair and bright blue eyes. And Hyuuga Hinata was real, too. Flowing indigo blue hair and soft pearl colored eyes. The cats were named after them (and mysteriously shared the same appearances and personalities). Right now, they were sitting next to Sasuke and Sakura, Sasuke who was sipping his coffee and looking bored as usual, Sakura who was nervously glancing around. Naruto was slurping the soup from his ramen, and Hinata was simply watching with slight curiosity. Before anyone could speak, Temari and Shikamaru joined them dropping into seats opposite. He leaned his head back in the chair and attempted to fall asleep. This was a drag, after all. **

"**Is this it?" Temari asked, "all we do is sit around and eat?"**

"**My idea of a day well used!" Naruto said between mouthfuls of noodles. **

"**Do you always find a need to be loud, cretin?" Sasuke hissed in his 'shut up-or-die' voice. **

"**Do you always have to rain on his happy parade, Sasuke?" someone asked out of nowhere, leaning over his brother from behind. Sasuke flinched with mild disgust. **

"**You. Again."**

"**Hey Itachi!" people cheered. **

"**Hello, all!" he said, the sunshine and happiness dripping from him made Sasuke gag and Naruto to cheer him on.**

**How are they best friends again?**

"**So! Shall we have some music?" Itachi asked. "Anyone have CD's? I would put mine in, of course, but—"**

"**Don't…even...think about it." Neji and Sasuke said together. **

"**I've got one!"**

"**Me too!"**

**Itachi collected them all and strode away, towards the CD player which had speakers everywhere. **

**Fast, exciting music flew through the restaurant. The place was totally full now, everyone was there. Evil Husband who beat up his wife for no reason most of the time, the toaster man, Mikoto, Fugaku…everyone. Except a few, actually. **

**The door slammed open. **

**All heads turned. **

**Jiraiya, Iruka, Pain and Deidara burst in with assorted musically toned battle cries. **

"**We have arrived-"**

"**To chapter 22-"**

"**For one-"**

"**Last-"**

"**Sta-a-a-a-nd!" **

**Total silence.**

**Somewhere, a cricket chirped. **

"**Actually we're part of a boy band. Make way for the villains!" **

"**Boy band?" Itachi gasped, bolting to Jiraiya, "Can I join?" **

**After which Jiraiya waved a hand in Uchiha's face and blabbered on upon how Itachi didn't seem to _fit_ in with the group. Whining resluted. **

**Other evil characters followed behind, (the rest of them weren't part of the band. The last three were female.)**

"**Why does everyone always hate the villains?" Karin pouted. "I was just acting!" **

**Yeah. Right. **

**A waitress came by our hero's table, taking more orders. **

"**Let's play a game, you guys," Sakura said after she'd gone. **

**A mix of moans and cheers. **

"**Telephone?" Hinata asked meekly. **

"**Nah. Telephones boring."**

"**It is not!" **

"**What about, 'Would You Like To Buy A Cat?'" **

**Everyone stared at Temari. Except Shikamaru. (Status: Asleep. / brooding and sulking and snoring. Lightly, it's true.) **

"**What?" **

"'**Would You Like To Buy A Cat?' It's a game. I'll teach you guys how to play. So, everyone think of a random object in your minds. Hurry up."**

**Neji decided he wasn't going to play, until Naruto grinned over evilly at him. **

"**Rather stare for hours lovingly into the eyes of your girlfriend than play a game, Neji?" **

**Temari snorted as Sasuke chuckled and Hinata giggled. **

"**Troublesome _git,_" he said savagely, feeling the color rise at somewhat of an alarming speed to his face. "I'll play."**

"**Good. Everyone ready? Now here's what you do. So, I turn to the person next to me, and it's…Shikamaru! Shikamaru!"**

"**What?" he shouted, jumping, as Naruto yelled by his ear. **

"**Are you playing or not?" **

"**Playing what?" **

"**Sheesh! Do you pay attention to anyone?" **

"**Yeah, for your information." **

"**We'd have proof if you were in love with someone. But seeing as how you're not—"**

"**How do you know?" he muttered icily but quietly. **

**Oops. **

**Collective laughter. **

"**Ooohh! Really? Who is it?" **

**Temari froze. **

"**No one," he said, clenching his teeth, looking at everyone but her as they all (except one) laughed.**

**Ever observant Sasuke knew he liked her since the beginning, and since Sakura was just getting to know them she didn't really know who. Surprisingly, Naruto did. Hinata looked at Shikamaru sympathetically, she couldn't imagine how horrible it would be for people to find out about how she liked N—**

"**Okay, just skip him," Temari said, recovering from her momentary shock as Naruto nudged her with his elbow. "Hinata—"**

**In the background, the music changed. It was something slow and sweet, perfectly calm and mellow. Hinata's heart almost stopped. This was…this was…**

"**Hinata?" Everyone was staring at her. **

**Kitty-Hinata stopped sprinting away from Kitty-Naruto, and stopped, ears pointed up. She felt something wrong. Running over to Hinata, Kitty- Hinata jumped into her lap, wondering what happened. Kitty- Naruto stopped at the leg of Hinata's chair, pawing gently at the hem of her soft cream colored dress. **

**Naruto, sitting across from her leaned forward, waving a hand in front of her face. This music was…her mother used to listen to this…it was… Her lip trembled and she shook her head once, then bolted up and ran out the nearest door, which was the kitchen, needing to get away from the sound. Kitty-Naruto and Hinata stared after her, along with Naruto and everyone else at the table. **

**She slapped open the double doors in the kitchen, and found herself facing the door that led outside. **

"**HEY! Girl! What you doin'?" **

**She ignored the cook and opened the door. It creaked and scraped against the ground as it refused to open smoothly. She jerked it out and managed to kick a rock into the doorway to keep it ajar. She stepped outside, into the sticky night air. It hung down on her like an itchy blanket. She walked a little ways, ducking under a broken fence post. She could still hear it. The music her mom had been listening to days before she'd passed away. Days before she started feeling ill. There was a strong memory attached to this. Her mother's face, beautiful but pained, a weak smile at her lips. _"Hinata…remember…I'll always love you." _After that day she wasn't allowed in the room, only her father and the doctors. And then she found out. **

**Now she was running, desperate to get away. It was too much, it hurt too much to listen. When she was sure the notes faded away in the wind, she swallowed and dropped down next to a dumpster. It smelled disgusting, but she knew no one would come looking for her next to it. Her dress was getting dirty, but oh well. She'd always be this shy, little, stuttering girl. He'd never like her, or notice her, for that matter. **

"**_You'll find someone nice, Hinata," _words came back, _"I know it." _**

**Mother…**

**She pulled her knees to her chest, forehead resting against them. She squeezed her eyes shut, and then her gentle sobs echoed in the alley. _Mom! I'm so lost without you!_ Oily smoke slipped into the alley. The hard gravel beneath her pricked against her skin. She pressed the material of her dress into her cheeks, letting her crystal tears run through. **

"**Well then." Naruto said, shrugging, "wonder what happened." **

"**No, you idiot," Sasuke said darkly, "you don't sit there and say 'wonder what happened.' You go to her." **

"**What-?" **

"**Seriously, Naruto," Tenten said, rolling her eyes, "do you know anything about how to treat a girl?" **

"'**Course I do! It's just…Hinata doesn't…think of me like—"**

"**Failure." Sasuke muttered angrily, tempted to grab Naruto's shirt collar and lift him up in the air.**

**He resisted. **

"**You're the only person who doesn't see that she has feelings for you, Naruto," Temari said. **

**Shikamaru yawned. This wasn't new information. Except for the pink-haired, they'd all been friends before filming began. **

**Sakura nodded at Naruto."Yeah! I've kind of been noticing! She does like you!" **

**Naruto blinked rapidly, flushing, then stood, nodded, and ran out the kitchen doors. Kitty-Naruto and Hinata took their places, looking over the rim of the table, staring at everyone expectantly. **

"**Meow?"**

**Hinata looked up at the sound of shifting pebbles, wiping her eyes. **

"**Who's there?" She asked, angry her voice was trembling. A face poked out behind the fence. She'd never seen him before. Alarm rose in her throat as the man smirked at her, hungry eyes narrowing.**

"**Well hello there," he said, voice dripping with fake interest. **

"**Hi," she said shakily, standing slowly and taking a few steps back, running into the dumpster. **

"**I've lost my way. Do you happen to know where the, uh, local pound is?" **

"**No-I do not." Sweat plastered her hair to her cheeks. She backed away as he took a step forward. **

**He smiled, showing his teeth: "That's okay." **

**She opened her mouth to cry out as he clamped his hand over it. Her grabbed her arm and yanked her towards him, dragging her down the alley in the direction where he came from. She kicked him hard for a second, and he released her mouth. For a second. She screamed. "HELP-"**

"**Enough of that, sweetie," he whispered by her ear, punching her cheek and covering her mouth with a rough cloth. Pain slapped through her. He began to drag her with more force, faster—tears started in her eyes. He held her completely immobile. Her heart sped up, this was where it would end—**

"**_Hey!" _Someone yelled. She looked up, past her blurry vision to see Uzumaki Naruto running after her. Relief washed into her heart. The man growled and kept going. **

"**Get your hands off her!" Naruto shoved his elbow into the man's neck, and he dropped Hinata all together, gasping for air. Naruto pulled her behind him and tied the guy down with a rope he found. He called the police and they came and took him away. **

**Naruto looked at Hinata. Then he jumped and spun her around, untying the cloth around her mouth. He let it fall slowly to the ground. He ran his finger lightly over the corner of her lip, where there was an ugly harsh red mark. **

"**T-Thank you, Naruto," she said softly, still trembling. **

"**No problem, Hinata," he said, shaking his head. Hair ruffling with a warm breeze. The white button up he was wearing had the sleeves rolled up to his elbows, and he fiddled with them now. "I'm sorry about…you know. Everything." **

**She blinked, not getting it. **

**He changed the subject. "You look really nice tonight." **

**A pleasant wave of heat. "You too," she said, upset her voice came out a squeak. She rubbed her bare shoulders. The memory of her mother was still fresh in her mind. She bit her lip, afraid the tears would come again. He took a step forward and slipped his hand under her elbow, pulling her close. Her breath caught in her throat. Naruto wasn't the absolute genius, but sometimes he just knew when people needed hugs. He sat down with her in his arms. She looked up at his cerulean eyes through wet lashes. She took a deep breath. **

"**I've…I've always hated myself because I was never brave enough, Naruto, but, I think I'm ready to tell you..That, um, I—"**

"**Naruto! Hinata! Itachi's voice cut in as he appeared by the dumpster, "Everyone's looking for you! I—oh…" Trademark grin spread, "am I interrupting something?" **

**She scrambled out of his arms, and they stood up. "Not..at all," Naruto said, because he already knew _exactly_ what she was going to say. And as they made their way inside, Hinata felt like, for some reason, he actually did. And she felt absolutely sure when he slipped his hand into hers. **

**Kiba stood up to go and get more sugar in his hot chocolate, (also trying to get _someone_ off his mind), when he ran SMACK into a person, ending up spilling his drink over both of them. It was a girl, with flowing blonde hair and light blue eyes. She slipped her headphones off, and let them fall around her neck. **

"**Oh my God, I'm sorry!" she said frantically, "let me help you!" **

"**It's fine," Kiba said quickly, "I—"**

"**No- it's my fault, wait here," she said, running off to get some napkins. Kiba stood there, frazzled and unsure what to do. And she was back, lightly pushing a stack of napkins into his arms and dropped some on the ground, cleaning it up. He mopped it off his clothes, she got it off her clothes, silently hyperventilating, (this was one of her favorite outfits), and plunked the soiled napkins into a nearby trashcan. He did too. They stood there, looking at each other. **

"**You wanna sit down? I've got some time before I need to go," she said, brushing a strand of hair away from her face. **

"**Yeah-sure," Kiba said, plopping into his seat, forgetting about the sugar. She sat across from him, smiling nervously. He ordered a cream and watermelon dish that was ringed with cherries. She had a cup of ice tea. "May I ask? What's your name?" **

"**Inuzuka Kiba," he said kind of automatically, "and this is Akamaru."**

**In response, he barked and jumped into the girls lap. "Yours?" **

"**Ino," she laughed as Akamaru licked her cheek, "Yamanaka Ino."**

**Anko sighed as she closed her eyes, leaning forward on the counter. This whole thing was giving her a headache. The constant noise of this stupid place was annoying. The music in the background kept changing, and right now it really wasn't that bad, but ever-so wonderfully she couldn't even barely _hear_ it, so the evening had been a total waste of time officially. She slumped over, head resting on the cool surface of the counter. She tried to fall asleep. It didn't exactly work. **

"**Excuse me, Miss?" **

**She jerked up and muttered savage things under her breath until she found herself looking up into the smiling face of Hatake Kakashi. Half his face was covered by a mask, and his grey hair was longer, but…his eyes were the same. She caught herself staring. He was back, after all this time. **

"**Miss? You all right?"**

**She cleared her throat. "Uh-yeah. Yeah." **

"**Sure?" **

**Did he not remember her? The last time she'd seen him was the 8th grade. He'd moved to the other side of the country in the middle of the year. And on his last day, he'd stood up and hugged her in front of everyone; she'd hugged him back, too. That was almost 15 years ago. **

"**Um…" **

**Staring again. Idiot. She looked away, face going red. Was this it? All it took to break down her tough walls was the reappearance of a childhood friend who she really truly actually loved?**

"**Is this seat taken?" he asked, motioning to the one at her side. **

"**No, please." He sat down, ordering a piece of fudge cake. He was wearing a dark hoodie and light jeans. **

"**So who were you?" she asked. He blinked. "In the story." **

"**Oh, yeah. I was the guy who saved Sakura, you know…" he held his arms up in an air violin pose, "Play violin, late to everything?" **

"**Oh, okay. I was the evil orphan lady. Sorry I didn't know about you; never read the whole thing. It was kind of long."**

"**Me neither. It's okay." He took a couple bites of his cake. **

**She twirled her empty glass around as Kakashi looked around. He saw Naruto walk in holding hands with Hinata, who looked slightly disheveled but otherwise okay. Kiba was over there talking to a pretty blonde he didn't know, Shikamaru and Temari kept up their whole love hate thing, arguing over nothing, Neji and Tenten were holding hands, and Sasuke and Sakura…well...**

"**Ah," Kakashi said, "Young love." **

"**I remember those days," Anko said slowly. "You think that's the totally it, you know? You think that's the person you're going to marry." She laughed bitterly. "Everything seems perfect then. Then you grow up and…" **

"**And you know it's not always like that," he finished for her. After a moment: "You speak from experience," he said softly. **

"**I think everyone does," she said, voice dropping as she brought her eyes up to his. "You too." **

"**Kind of," he said, looking away and clearing his throat. "I felt that. A couple times. But it was once that it seemed real. I mean, sort of. It was…" he paused. "A long time ago. I left someone behind, when I was…younger. It's hard to explain."**

"**No, I get it," she said quickly, refraining from adding _because_ _that girl was me. _**

"**And I've met so many people, running around the world, searching for just one person who would be perfect for me." He held up his index finger, chuckling and shaking his head. "Scrambling around…and I'm back here again. Square one." Silence. The music changed again, louder this time so more people could hear it. **

**Kakashi played with his fork, then started taking the icing off of his cake. **

"**Habit?" she asked shortly. **

"**Yeah," he said slowly, "I've been doing it forever. But…I thought you'd remember that…Anko." **

**The sound of her name leaving his lips recalled so many old memories Anko could do nothing but put her arms around him like she had so long ago. He set down his fork to embrace her. "You remembered…"she whispered, "how? I thought you didn't."**

"**Frankly, you're kind of hard to forget."**

**Jiraiya took the stage with Pain, Iruka, Deidara, and the evil husband showed up at the last second. "I just want to say to everyone that divorce should be the last option in a marriage. It's only the very last resort if you can't make the relationship work." **

"**Uh, thanks. For that. You're right." Jiraiya said, than took over. Than Iruka, took the mic for a moment. "Oh yeah!" he said, "My associates and I have been discussing—"**

"**_You're _associates?" Jiraiya gawked, "you mean _my_ associates!" He was conveniently ignored.**

"**We have come to a conclusion, that Uchiha Itachi, despite not having an evil role in the story, may join our band!" **

"'**Not evil?'" Sasuke scoffed over at the rosette, who laughed as she clapped. **

**With much fanfare and showing off, then apologies and bowing, Itachi made his way to the stage. "Thank you! Thank you!" **

"**He doesn't deserve that," Sasuke muttered coldly, sulking. Whether out of jealousy-no way- or not, he crossed his arms and huffed.**

"**So he's always annoyed, Naruto?" Sakura whispered.**

"**Oh, yeah," the orange haired whispered, standing up to get drinks with Hinata (or going to raid the kitchens), "always. It's his default emotion."**

"**Shut up, dobe." **

**Kiba didn't think it was possible to fall in love again in a couple of hours, but by the time Ino stood to leave, he was head over heels.**

"**See you around?" he asked quickly, as a kitten (Yuko) ran away with Akamaru. **

**She grinned. "Absolutely." **

**He watched her go, and when the door clicked shut behind her, he felt more complete than he had in quite a while.**

"**I need some air," Temari said, flipping out her fan and heading out. **

"**Probably means she's going to explore the city and end up getting lost," Shikamaru said tiredly, "might as well go with. Troublesome, but... See you guys later." He departed. They navigated their way through the densely populated restaurant. **

"**Let's go exploring, too!" Tenten said, getting up with Neji. "Childish," he murmured, then half smiled and shrugged. "Why not?" **

"**Sasuke?" He looked at her. Sasuke could speak without words. A death glare says it all. "Fine. Sakura?"**

"**I think I'll…"she flicked her eyes at the raven haired boy opposite, "I'll hang here." **

"**Okay! Bye!" **

**And then there were two. Silence. Applause after the band finished, and then Tsunade got up on the little stage. "Hey everyone!" she said after the cheers died down. "I'm going to sing "What If" by Colbie Caillat!" The musicians went up and took their places. And they started.**

"**This is a good one," Sakura said, as Tsunade's voice flew through the room. **

"**Never heard it," Sasuke said, smoothing down the corner of his black button up shirt. "but it's all right." **

**Her heart sped up as she took a breath and turned to him. "Hey, um, I just…" she searched for words, "I wanted to ask you…for a long time now…uh…in the story…you—"**

"**..I…"**

"**You…we were…in love," she said quickly, swallowing, "and I just want to know…was it real? Do you really?"**

**He looked at her, then exhaled through his nose, closing his eyes for a second. When he opened them, he was smirking his smile. But his eyes were warm. After a moment or two of staring at nothing in particular, he turned back to her. He opened his mouth, closed it, then opened it again. **

"**Sakura," he said, "you were the first…with whom it felt actually _real_. There's no way I can forget that."**

"**So…" she started, biting her lip.**

"**So yes," he said gently, "definitely." **

**Her face went hot as she grinned. "Okay, cool. And I…always did. Since we started the story." He kind of figured it out a long time ago, but didn't say that.**

**He looked past her, out the open window, and for a moment, the moon was uncovered by clouds, sending weak white light onto them. A cherry blossom tree nearby shed some petals in a warm wind, ruffling Sakura's hair. A single flower landed gently between them. He picked it up and balanced it on his finger. "For some reason," Sasuke said slowly, "I always knew you were the one." **

**Eyes met. Emerald and onyx. Each of them felt something right then, at that second... **

**She stopped, smiled, and quoted the song, whispering along with Tsunade: **

"'**_I wanna stay right here in this moment with you, over and over and over again…'" _**

"**Don't worry," he said softly, leaning over the table and brushing a lock of hair behind her ear, "The way it looks now, you always will be." **

**_The Actual End._**

**A/N: I don't want to make this seem like a _The Hunger Games _cliché or anything, because I'm sure it happens to many actors, right? They're in love in the movie or show, and then they end up getting married in real life. Right? Yeah. **

**DISCLAIMER: I don't own the quote: "If you truly love someone, you'll want them to be happy, even if it's not with you." Or "I wanna stay right here in this moment with you over and over and over again." I don't own the game "Would You Like To Buy A Cat?" either. I always try explaining it to people, but it's kinda confusing. It's fun if you know how to play it and you have a lot of people. :D. **

**Yeah, and the ending (sorry if it was cheesy! I couldn't think of a great line to put to sum everything up but oh well) did that make sense? They get to stay in that moment because that's how this ends. Okay? Yeah…again, please don't flame me. Constructive criticism is always welcome, though! Haha, okay, so, how was it? Reviews would be awesome! Thanks for reading! Bye ;)**


End file.
